


Ticket to Ride

by Sunshinebunnie



Series: I Would Know You Anywhere... [2]
Category: Good Girls (TV)
Genre: AU, Biting, Blowjobs, Canon-adjacent, Cunnilingus, F/M, Finger Fucking, Orgasm Delay, Scratching, Slow Burn, Vaginal Sex, competitive Beth, dominant Rio
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-30
Updated: 2019-06-30
Packaged: 2020-05-30 23:31:54
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 23,944
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19413724
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sunshinebunnie/pseuds/Sunshinebunnie
Summary: Set several months after "Poisons to Suit." Despite the chemistry between them, Beth has studiously refused to seek Rio out. When fate gives Rio a reason to incorporate Boland Motors into his criminal organization via Dean, he leverages the connection to reconnect with Beth. Once again, they can't deny their attraction to one another, and sparks fly!**Note: You don't need to read Poisons to Suit first to enjoy this one-shot, although it is recommended. 😊😊**





	Ticket to Ride

**Author's Note:**

> First--THANK YOU so much to each and every one of you taking the time to read this. It really means a lot to me! I hope I've created a story that you find enjoyable.
> 
> Second--this work is unbeta'd, so I take full ownership of any and all errors and omissions.
> 
> Third--apologies in advance if my Spanish is garbled. My written Spanish is a little rusty. 
> 
> Fourth--if you want to come find me on Tumblr, you can reach out @sunshinebunnie.

****Rio sipped his coffee slowly savoring the dark chocolatey taste. As much as he appreciated the convenience of his Keurig, he couldn’t deny that it didn’t hold a candle to Carla’s Cuban coffee. He’d even told Dags once (only somewhat) jokingly that if they ever split up, he was keeping Carla in the breakup. Dags could always find another job--he was solid and resourceful, an asset to any organization. Rio, however, had no guarantee of finding someone else who could make coffee as well as Dags’ wife.

Dags walked in to the kitchen carrying Rio’s goddaughter, Ana, upside down over his shoulder as she flailed her arms wildly against his back laughing the entire time. “ _¡Tio! ¡Tio! ¡Ayudame!_ ” she squealed. Rio gave her an indulgent smile while he shook his head and shrugged. “ _Lo siento._ I can only help _princesas_ after I’ve finished my coffee.” The little girl pouted for a minute before trying a new tactic. It happened in all of a split second--one minute she was banging her arms purposelessly against her father’s back, the next she curled herself around his side the better to tickle his ribs and his armpit through the gap in his stark white t-shirt. The minute Dags felt his daughter’s little fingers digging into his skin, he let out a high pitched scream that nearly caused Rio to drop his coffee cup from laughing so hard.

Dags just glared at his best friend as he summarily put Ana on the floor with a well-meaning swat to get her out of the kitchen. He walked over to the stove, grabbing a coffee cup out of the cupboard next to the sink as he went. Before reaching for the coffee though, he threw a glance at Rio and asked tiredly, “ _Pendejo_ , did you even leave me some of my wife’s coffee today?” His friend gave him a shit-eating grin to which Dag dropped his head to his chest with a groan before Rio slid a full cup of coffee that he’d been hiding behind his back across the island. The stockier man took the cup with a grateful sigh . Swallowing a large gulp of the dark roast, he felt at least half the tension in his shoulders dissipate as the heat suffused his chest. Setting the cup carefully back down on the island, he tilted his head toward the ceiling and said, “Maricela’s having another baby.”

Rio looked at his friend for a minute before saying, “Isn’t that your sister’s fifth?”

Dags ran his hand over his face as he nodded. “ _¿Hermano, no puedes darle un trabajo?_ Get him off my sister? He’s got too much time to himself.”

Rio arched an eyebrow at the man. He took a contemplative sip of his coffee before eventually saying, “Doesn’t your brother-in-law work for the Post Office?”

“Yeah,” Dags replied taking another sip of his own coffee, “Doesn’t mean he can’t pick up a side gig.”

The thin man cocked his head at his friend and studied him. Putting his empty cup down on the counter, he asked, “Is Maricela still happy with him?”

“She’s still fucking him, ain’t she?” Dags replied more than a little annoyed.

Rio just grinned before adding, “And is she hitting you up for money?”

Dags scowled at the other man, copping on to the point he knew Rio was leading up to. When he didn’t respond, his best friend pressed his point. “ _¿Pues?_ ”

Begrudgingly, Dags muttered, “No.”

His wiry best friend slid his hands out along the countertop behind him until his arms were spread out like the wings of his eagle tattoo. “ _Entonces, ¿cuál es el problema?_ _Tu hermana está encantada con su esposo_ , and he’s providing for her and the kids,” he said reasonably. 

Dags glared at him. “My baby sister has no business having five kids. That’s all I’m saying.”

Rio laughed until he was sagging against the sink. When he finally collected himself, he gave his best friend a pointed look before saying, “Is that what the problem is? Maricela’s _having sex_ ?” Dags’ knuckles turned white as his hand balled threateningly into a fist. Rio just ignored him as he continued, “Your baby sister is thirty-two and has been married for ten years, Dags. _Tienes cuatro sobrinas_ who’re eight, six, four, and two. I think your sister knows what she’s doing.” He knew he could’ve left it at that, but Rio was started to get more than a little pissed off at the dark looks he was getting from his best friend, so he threw out “If it’s such a big deal to you, at the next barbeque ask Diego how he feels about you fucking his sister” just to be a dick. 

If his best friend could’ve gotten away with killing him in the moment, Rio was almost certain Dags would’ve drawn on him, if the anger radiating off the other man was anything to go off. Just as his hands started to get that familiar itch whenever they were about to go for his gun, Carla swanned into the kitchen with baby Amelia on her hip while threateningly waving a slipper at her eleven year old son. “Francisco José, if I find your cleats in the hall one more time, you’ll be _lucky_ if I only beat you with my slipper!” The chastised boy cut a look to his dad hoping for some kind of sympathy, immediately shifting Dags’ attention away from Rio. Sensing her husband was about to cave to their son’s kicked puppy look, she pointed the slipper intentionally at Dags saying, “Don’t you start. I’m already mad at you for having to listen to you bitch all night about _tu hermana_ . Worked a twelve hour shift at the hospital only to come home to you moaning about becoming an uncle again. ¡ _Dios mio!_ I can only imagine what you would’ve been like if your sister had _bad_ news!” Rio ducked his head to hide the smile that threatened to break out watching his two oldest friends as Dags instantly turned into a quivering slice of _flan_ when confronted by the righteous indignation of his 5’2” wife. If he was being entirely honest, Rio could certainly appreciate Dags’ sense of self-preservation. He’d been on the receiving end of a Carla-wielded slipper more than once over the years—she was deceptively strong relative to how tiny she was and had a deadly accurate throw. 

The whirlwind of Carla’s fury died down nearly as soon as it started though after Amelia started giggling and blowing wet raspberries at her father. His friend plucked his youngest child off his wife’s hip spinning the toddler up into the air as he simultaneously leaned over to plant a soft kiss to the crown of Carla’s head. There was an intimacy to the domesticity of the scene before him that made Rio’s heart ache a little. 

*************************************

Even before Dags and Carla started dating, they’d shared a companionable bond that went beyond mere friendship. At first, Rio had been jealous of their connection and of the fact he had to share the man he’d been best friends with since he was six years’ old with someone else; however, as they’d grown older, he’d come to realize he wanted a connection like that of his own with someone. There was a brief minute of time when Rio thought he’d found it, back when things were still in the honeymoon phase with Marcus’ mom, Alicia. The longer they’d stayed together though, the more he realized he and his ex had very little connection when it came to anything other than sex. Marcus had barely turned two by the time they called it quits for good. 

Alicia had left him on a Wednesday. He’d just finished a meeting with Gretchen and his financial advisor. Rio had purchased some new commercial properties, and wanted to explore what would be the best means of gifting them to Marcus. The meeting had gone longer than he’d anticipated, so he’d texted Alicia to let her know he was sorry for missing dinner. His ex had sent him two texts back. The first was a picture of his lone place setting covered in foil meticulously laid out on their dining room table. Nothing about the photo seemed unusual, so he hadn’t bothered to reply. The second text she’d sent him shortly thereafter though was a picture of her and Marcus’ stacked up luggage in front of their entrance way with a simple caption: ‘Now you don’t have to worry anymore about coming up with excuses.’ 

Rio had turned up on Dags and Carla’s doorstep at one in the morning—after stopping at the neighborhood liquor store for supplies—with a half drunk handle of Jack Daniel’s. He’d reeked of pineapple Fanta after accidentally spilling most of a two-liter bottle on himself as he’d stumbled through the streets to their house. After calling him a host of colorful names for waking them up at such an ungodly hour in the middle of the week (not that he remembered, but Carla had owned up to it the next day), Carla had left Rio in Dags’ care while she’d made up their spare room and pulled together some clean clothes for him. He and Dags had walked around to the back patio, taking up seats at the wooden picnic table Carla had given her husband as an anniversary gift that year, and proceeded to kill off the rest of the whiskey. Rio was nearly positive they’d drunk in silence (He suspected he’d been muttering “ _Quiero una Carla_ ” to himself, but if he had, Dags had the decency to never mention it). 

The next morning, although she was still pissed about being woken up so early, Carla was at least more sympathetic about it, having found out from Alicia what had happened. By the time Rio and Dags had woken up--each with a raging hangover--Carla had made them both fritatta and her life-saving coffee. When her husband had eventually gone to brush his teeth, she’d refilled Rio’s coffee and gently said, “ _Mi querido, ella está una idiota. No sabe lo que necesita._ ” He’d looked at her blearily and gave her a little half-hearted shrug. Holding up his chin to force him to keep eye contact with her, Carla said fiercely, “I’m serious, Rio. _Necesitas una buena mujer_. And she was never good enough for you.”

****************************************

Rio didn’t realize he’d been daydreaming until he looked over at his best friend’s wife and saw the expectant look on her face. He gave her a sheepish shrug to which she huffed out a mildly exasperated breath and repeated, “I hope you managed to talk some sense into him. The gender reveal party is on Saturday, and I’m not dealing with his pissy attitude about Maricela any longer.” Rio gave her a cryptic smile and an inconclusive shrug in response causing her to let out another small huff of annoyance as she threw up her hands.

As Carla slid her slipper back on, she caught sight of the television in the breakfast nook that Dags sometimes liked to watch in the mornings. Nodding at the ad on the tv, she said, “Hey _papí_ , you need to feel important? _Compra tu hermana un nuevo coche._ Something with a third row of seats like what my cousin Eduardo just got.” Dags shot his best friend a disbelieving look at his wife’s cheeky suggestion, but Rio’s attention was completely glued to the television. 

The last time he’d seen the man in the ad wearing the ridiculous pig costume, he’d been in a cheap, ill-fitting suit hitting on girls who were way too young for him and criminally ignoring the feisty, stacked redhead he’d walked into the bar with. (Not that Rio’d complained. He’d been more than willing to entertain Elizabeth.) He cracked a hint of a smile as he said, “I think your wife’s right. Maricela could use a new mama van. Besides, it’s the end of the month. It’s a good time to play ‘Let’s-make-a-deal.’” 

Dags and Carla both looked at Rio suspiciously. Dags because, despite his earlier bitching, knew Rio tended to avoid getting mixed up in other people’s family business-- _even if_ Maricela was practically related to him. And Carla because, Rio _never_ took sides so quickly--he was like a cat: he liked to bat people around awhile for his amusement before revealing the decision he’d already made. Rio just gave them both his patented “choir boy” look despite knowing it had stopped working on either of them since they were all in high school. 

Dags gave his wife a look before cutting his attention back to his best friend and saying, “Well, if we don’t have any meetings this morning, we could check out that one down on Six Mile over near the check cashing place where Yolanda’s boyfriend JT works?” Anyone else probably would’ve missed the negligible clenching of Rio’s jaw as he worked to keep his poker face; however, the two other adults in the room knew him far better than that. Clocking the twitch at the same moment as her husband, Carla added, “You could always take a drive out to Grosse Pointe too. I heard a new Volvo dealership opened over there. You know those cars are practically bulletproof.” 

Rio was torn: neither of his current options were very palatable. On the one hand, he could say nothing and deal with his best friends giving him shit, or, on the other hand, he could press his point about wanting to go to _that_ specific dealership and risk giving them _more_ ammunition to give him shit about. In the space of a heartbeat, his survival instincts took over and he heard himself saying, “Nah, man, something tells me _that_ dealership is going to be good for _our_ business.” 

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

The back-to-school shopping had been the last straw. 

Beth had spent most of June and even part of July fighting with Dean over who was supposed to pay what for the children’s summer camps. Dean felt Beth was needlessly racking up expenses by signing Kenny up for a competitive travel swim team and Jane up for the local summer soccer league, while letting Emma register for a month-long cooking camp and letting Danny sign up for some eSports thing. (Beth didn’t particularly understand the eSpirts thing, but she’d agreed to let Danny do it after Annie had explained colleges were starting to offer scholarships for eSports.) Since Dean had gone and spent all of the children’s college savings on his various girlfriends, Beth figured it would be prudent to start grooming their kids for any types of scholarships they might qualify for down the road. 

Then Dean’s first weekend with the kids happened in August. Each one of them came home with the latest and greatest tech from Apple--tablets for each of them; new laptops for Kenny, Emma, and Danny; new noise cancelling headphones for the four of them; and a couple smartwatches for Kenny and Emma along with a variety of replacement bands. All-in-all, her ex-husband easily dropped over $20,000.00 on electronics for their children. 

Something was up. Sure, Dean had had good months at the dealership before, but not in a I-now-have-an-extra-twenty-Gs-laying-around kind of way. The little voice in the back of her head that perpetually wanted to give him credit for stuff he didn’t do tried to suggest that maybe he’d financed the whole purchase, but Beth knew better. Her ex went on a spending spree because he could, to show off to the world how flush he was—to maybe impress some eighteen year-old child enough to convince her to let him sleep with her. _Nothing_ Dean could say would convince her that his back-to-school spree was purely meant for their children’s benefit.

Dean’s mom had taken the kids for the week up to her lake house in the upper peninsula, so Beth decided to stop by the dealership after hours to talk to Dean. She couldn’t bring herself to visit his apartment. He was still a slob on his own, and twenty plus years of picking up after him was a habit she still found herself trying to break. She also didn’t want to invite him by the house—he always got that hopeful/kicked puppy look when she invited him in only to realize she didn’t want him to stay. The anxiety from expecting him to make a scene always left her guts to twist. 

Even after hours though, Boland Motors was still neutral ground. It was a public space, so Beth didn’t feel compelled to mother her ex, and he wouldn’t risk his pride by groveling in front of her. 

Despite the divorce, she still had a key to get in. Jane had accidentally left her dubby in Dean’s office once on a Thursday when she’d had a half day. It hadn’t been his weekend though, so he’d decided to take off the next day with his latest girlfriend for a mini vacation in Ann Arbor. Beth hadn’t been able to get ahold of him until that Sunday, by which point she’d honestly contemplated just driving her minivan through his office window just to get the blanket back. When she’d finally reached him, the redhead had surprised herself by strong arming the man into giving her a key to the dealership for any future such emergencies. (Although she thought of it as “strong arming” her ex, the reality—she suspected—was that in Dean’s mind giving her the key freed him from the responsibility of having to keep track of their children’s possessions since Beth could now just come by the dealership whenever the kids forgot stuff regardless of him being around.) 

It was late—after 10 by the time she finally reached Boland Motors—and for a minute, she almost thought Dean wasn’t there. However, as she pulled her car around the lot getting ready to head home, she saw a faint light at the far end of the showroom that could only be Dean’s office. Parking her minivan close to the front door, Beth took a second to mentally prepare herself. Although she was expecting her ex to be alone, she couldn’t honestly say she _hadn’t_ caught him messing around with women in his office before. (It had been awkward and embarrassing for everyone involved, and Beth largely tried to forget it had ever happened.) 

As she walked across the tile flooring in the showroom, Beth tried not to bring too much weight down on her boot heels. The clattering always seemed to echo far too loudly in the unpopulated space, and it made her uncomfortable to announce her presence in such a seemingly aggressive way. Once she was closer to his office, Beth strained to hear any sounds that might indicate she was going to walk in on something that would make her want to scrub her brain. She heard something—low sounds, like a pair of men’s voices speaking. 

It took her brain a second to catch up to the fact that there was _another man_ in her ex-husband’s office after hours. As she got closer to the partially ajar door, _something_ about the muffled second voice niggled at the back of her mind. Her hand had just begun pushing the door open further when she heard the unknown speaker say, “Yeah, you don’t gotta worry about that,” stopping her dead in her tracks. She _knew_ that voice, could picture the person it belonged to as easily as if she was looking at a photo. Even though both the voice and the man it belonged to featured _very_ prominently in her fantasies since their tryst at the bar several months earlier, Beth had consciously avoided returning there. 

With distance (physical and otherwise) had come Beth’s unshakable belief that sleeping with Rio had been a massive mistake. Despite the fact that they clearly had chemistry every time they’d spoken prior to having sex, and despite the fact that Rio didn’t strike her as a huckster like Dean, she’d convinced herself that the younger man had only slept with her as a joke—some perverse type of trophy hunt. Although Dean may have stripped her of much of her identity, Beth Boland still had her pride. She’d be damned if she was going to be one of those sad moms in the carpool line forever chasing after a younger man who never called again once he fulfilled his _American Pie_ fantasy of hooking up with a MILF like Stiffler’s Mom. 

By the time she’d processed who the voice in Dean’s office belonged to, the door had finished swinging open revealing a smirking Rio and a dumbstruck Dean. It was almost comical watching Dean’s face go from “hand in the cookie jar” to “yay! Mom’s home!” as he realized Beth was there. Bounding up from his desk with an enthusiasm that made her cringe, Dean said loudly, “Bethie!” She clenched her jaw so hard at the loathed nickname, she was amazed she didn’t dislodge a filling. Even though Rio had ducked his head to his shoulder, Beth had seen the grin he’d been trying to hide at her reaction. She refused to think too deeply about the fact that a man she’d met four times now seemed to know her better than a man who’d ostensibly known her for over twenty years. Just as Rio hadn’t missed her reaction to being called Bethie, Beth didn’t miss the hardness that settled into Rio’s dark eyes at the possessive way Dean slid his arm across her shoulders as he half hugged, half turned her to introduce her to the exotic man sitting in the back corner of Dean’s office. “Beth,” Dean said in that way he used to introduce her to people at holiday networking parties, “this is my new business partner, Rio.” 

There was an undeniable electricity that shot between them as his limber fingers firmly wrapped around her more delicate ones. When she eventually found her voice—made even more difficult by the smoldering look he was giving her that made her wonder how she hadn’t burst into flames yet—she said slightly questioningly, “ _Business partners_?” 

The hard look in his eyes turned surprisingly playful as he gave her a small grin and said, “You’re right, _Elizabeth_. It does seem a little soon, doesn’t it? Probably best not to label it.” Even though his last sentence was directed to her ex, Rio’s mesmerizing eyes never left hers nor did he let go of her hand. Beth had to fight hard to repress the full body shiver that threatened to overtake her body as his index finger absently stroked the sensitive flesh on the inside of her wrist. There wasn’t much she could do about the way her nipples promptly pebbled against the soft cotton of her t-shirt other than pray neither man noticed. She felt pretty confident her prayer would be at least partially answered as Dean’s whiny voice broke through their shared moment. “I’m sorry. Have you two met before, Bethie?” 

The latent Elizabeth Marks part of her wanted to give Dean a _very_ detailed description of just how well she knew his new “partner,” but the part of her that knew they still needed to deal with shared custody of their four children quashed the impulse like a cockroach. Thinking quickly, Beth turned her face away from Rio as she smoothly lied, “I was just caught off guard by,” using the excuse of gesturing to her neck to remove her hand from Rio’s grasp. She felt more than heard the huff of breath Rio let out as he swallowed a laugh at her excuse. Subconsciously, she wondered when he’d managed to get close enough to her that she could feel his breath on her skin. She struggled not to squirm as her pussy began to throb tauntingly. Dean’s normal obliviousness returned as he said in that way that said he was trying _way_ too hard to be cool, “Oh, I know, right? I have a hard enough time staying still not to get nicked by a barber, let alone to get repeatedly stuck in the neck with a needle.” Rio’s response was so quiet, Beth would’ve sworn she imagined it if not for the hairs on the back of her neck fluttering along with his warm breath, “What can I say, _ma_? I’m real good at being patient when there’s something I want.” She could already feel the damp patch in her underwear turning soupy as her pussy went into overdrive at the implied temptation underneath his words. 

************************************************

Rio learned years ago that _patience_ was truly the most important trait someone needed to succeed in his line of work—patience to wait out the cops, patience to go after rivals at more advantageous times, patience to flip his game. Of course, he had also learned over the years that patience like his had other benefits. 

As he and Dags had driven across town to Boland Motors, he felt like the universe was looking out for him. Ever since that night in his bar several months earlier, he hadn’t been able to shake the memory of the red headed temptress. _Elizabeth_ . She had haunted him everywhere he went. Although he’d gotten much better about _not_ scanning every remotely ginger-looking woman in his vicinity for a glimpse of her, it was only because he’d felt like the _bruja_ cast a spell on him so that he’d just _know_ whenever she was near. His sixth sense had started tingling as soon as he’d seen the ridiculous-looking man in the pig costume on the tv commercial. 

They’d been halfway to the dealership when Dags finally spoke up. “You wanna tell me what that was back there?” Rio didn’t even bother cutting his eyes over to his friend as he kept driving toward Boland Motors. 

The biggest issue Rio had working with someone who’d known him his whole life was that unlike his other employees, Dags was too damn insightful. When his best friend refused to answer his question, the stockier man decided to try a different tactic. “Carla wants you to have dinner with us next week. Some new red headed nurse started working with her, and she thinks you’d be interested. I told her you’re off redheads though.” Rio sat stock still as he contemplated his next move. He did not miss the sly look his friend gave him before he casually added, “Yeah, I said you musta done fucked your mystery woman something good cuz I ain’t never seen you be so relaxed for so long.” Rio’s left hand gripped the steering wheel tighter. Even though Dags was right, he refused to give him the satisfaction of an answer because one, he didn’t owe him anything, and two, him implying Elizabeth was only a hit-it-and-quit-it fascination for him was insulting to both of them. Luckily, the thinner man knew his best friend was being deliberately provocative, which was only part of the reason why he didn’t simply dump his ass out on the side of the highway. (The other reason being that he knew Carla would cut him off from his coffee supply for life once she found out.) 

Dags gave him a disgusted head shake as he relaxed back into the buttery leather passenger seat in Rio’s Cadillac as he muttered, “ _Cabrón,_ ” under his breath.

He let his friend stew for awhile, the only sound in the car the feminine voice of the maps app giving him an update on the traffic as they drove toward the dealership. Eventually, Rio threw the other man a lifeline. “When you first met Carla, how’d you know she was gonna be ride or die for you?” 

His friend let out a long whistle followed by a low chuckle. “Man, she was stacked at fifteen. That’s all I needed to know back then.” Rio cut his eyes across the car. He’d been there when they met. It was true that Carla was more of a _mamacíta_ than a lot of the other girls in their grade, but he also knew it was more than that for Dags. “So was Lydia Ortiz, but I didn’t see you orbiting her like a planet,” Rio tossed out. The man beside him let out a full throated, body shaking laugh. As he worked to regain his composure, he said, “ _Es verdad_ .” He thumped the side panel of the door with the flat of his hand in a way that made Rio internally cringe--one of these days, he just knew Dags was going to scuff up his leather interior. Before he had a chance to remark on it though, his friend said thoughtfully, “It’s like there’s always been this magnet inside her that I can’t resist, and if I try to ignore it, it only gets stronger.” Rio gave his friend a small nod of acknowledgement--it was much easier for him to appreciate the sentiment now at 35 than it had been when they were 15. After a minute, his friend added, “ _No se, hermano_ . Everything’s always just been _easier_ with Carla. Fighting. Fucking. Hell, even breathing. _No puedo explicarlo_.” 

Anything Rio might’ve added died in his chest as Dags let out a “daaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaamn” as both men eyed up the absurd inflatable gorilla bobbing back and forth over the car dealership they had just rolled up to. Rio had parked around the corner from the lot. The last thing he needed was some salesperson salivating over the trade-in value of his Cadillac, trying to give him a hard sell into some ridiculous sports car like a flashy Corvette. As they’d walked up to the dealership, there was something so sad, yet so promising about it. It made Rio’s fingers itch. Even though he’d been slightly kidding when he’d mentioned wanting to check out Boland Motors as an investment opportunity, now that they were there, it actually didn’t seem so far fetched. Rio could sense desperation the way sharks smell blood, and in his experience, desperate people were willing to take deals without completely reading the fine print. It was a human foible he’d happily exploited to his benefit many, many times over the years. 

As Dags wandered the lot looking at minivans, Rio assessed the potential Boland Motors had to contribute to his organization. It was on fairly prime real estate with convenient access to the highway. There was pretty steady foot traffic, so any upticks in “sales” wouldn’t seem unreasonable. The lot was surrounded by permanent fencing, so anything that might be _inside_ the cars after hours would have an added layer of protection. There even seemed to be a bustling service department--a super easy way to inflate invoices through increased “labor” costs. 

By the time his best friend had narrowed down his search to two different minivans, Rio had decided he was going to fold the dealership into his business empire. If that happened to have the added consequence of bringing Elizabeth back into his life, then that was simply the universe’s way of telling them not to ignore the irresistible magnetic pull between them. 

In the end, it had been embarrassing to see how quickly the car man had _jumped_ at Rio’s suggested business partnership. All it had taken was flashing a few stacks of fake cash when Dags had returned later that evening to finish paying for the minivan to get the general conversation started, and from there, Dean did all the heavy lifting himself. 

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

While finding Rio in her ex-husband’s office was a shock, Beth had to admit that she certainly had far fewer questions about the back to school shopping. If Dean wasn’t so intrinsically stupid, she probably would’ve blamed him for getting wrapped up in something that she was sure about above his paygrade, was probably dangerous, and was most assuredly illegal. As it was, she sent up a tiny prayer to a higher power she wasn’t quite sure she still believed in to keep her ex from any permanent harm for the sake of their children. 

Pointedly ignoring the younger man’s comment about patience, Beth turned her full attention back to her ex and said, “When you get a chance, we should discuss the back to school shopping you did for the kids. I can probably pay you back for the tablets, and maybe the smartwatches. Really though, Dean, getting them all that stuff was unnecessary. Kenny’s the only one who really needs a computer for school, and I still have that HP desktop set up in the old office.” She wasn’t sure if the bile rising up the back of her throat was due more to the arrogant preening her ex started doing at the mention of his excessive generosity, or the smug humor she could see dancing at the corners of Rio’s eyes. 

It suddenly hit her. He’d done it to lure her out. Somehow, some way, Rio had cast a spell over Dean and gotten him to do one of the few things _he_ must’ve known would’ve inspired an immediate response from Beth. She cut her eyes over to the younger man as a firmness settled into the line of her mouth. It was brief, but there--a moment of shared eye contact where she knew he knew that she’d figured out what he’d done, and he telegraphed her a not-at-all-apologetic “You got me!” look. 

Turning on her heel, she said by way of parting, “Well, it’s getting late, so I’m going to get going. Rio, it was nice to meet you. Dean, let me know what you want to do about the electronics.”

Given that she’d already figured out that Rio was the one actually responsible for the spending spree, she wasn’t surprised when Dean simply waved her off with grand magnanimity. She made another token showing of pushback, to make sure she sold it for Dean’s benefit, before finally letting herself out of his office. 

Somehow, it also didn’t surprise her that despite her five minute head start on walking out of the dealership and not taking any detours such as a bathroom break, Rio _still_ managed to beat her back to her car. Now that it was just the two of them with her ex nowhere in sight, Beth took her mask off and gave the younger man a scathing look as she seethed, “ _Just what do you think you’re doing?_ ” 

He gazed back at her with an amused placidity that only served to infuriate her more as he replied with carefully measured pleasantness, “Why hello, _Elizabeth_. It’s good to see you too. You’re looking well.” 

She could feel her nostrils flare as her eyes closed to slits and she forced all of her bottled up feelings since their last encounter at the bar into her glare. Rio just laughed. He honest to God laughed at her. Oddly enough, Beth didn’t feel like it was mean-spirited or mocking though, like she frequently felt whenever Dean laughed at something she did or said. Suddenly, the righteous indignation that had filled her sails deflated. 

Beth moved to lean against the side of her car next to Rio. Even though they weren’t touching, there was an undeniable comfort she got just from the radiant body heat that seemed to pass between them like a shared electrical charge. Sighing, she tilted her head up to look up at the light-polluted night sky, as she said, “You know he’s an idiot, right?” The man beside her just let out a small amused chuckle. “I’m not kidding,” she added with a little more forceful sincerity, “He probably spent over twenty grand on electronics for our kids and _legitimately_ didn’t expect me to say anything about it.” 

Rio pursed his lips in an amused smirk for a minute before replying with a smile in his voice, “Well, he certainly gets points for style.” 

She whirled around so quickly to look at him that the ends of her hair brushed his cheek. He’d deny it if anyone asked him about it, but the whisper of her hair against his face coupled with the faint memory of her floral shampoo caused goosebumps to erupt across his skin as his cock started to swell. Elizabeth studied his face with a deliberate gravitas, her captivating blue eyes teasing and probing him, pulling at his soul as she took his measure as a man. There was an unmistakable tiredness to her voice as she eventually said, “You know you can’t trust him.”

He let out a genuine laugh at that as he nodded his head decisively. “I known that since the first time I saw him at my bar,” he replied easily. 

“I don’t understand,” she said a little incredulously, “You know he’s a flashy idiot who can’t be trusted. Why get into business with him?”

He leveled a full blown grin at her that caused her pussy to contract with tingling flutters. The dark liquid pools of his eyes threatened to drown her with their intensity as he said with an unexpectedly low growl, “You never came back to the bar to see me.” 

She struggled to swallow as all her reasons for avoiding him for the past several months abruptly appeared to be completely off base. Having been lured in by a man with a good line once though, Beth refused to cave so easily to the instinct within her that was screaming at her to trust the man standing next to her. The redhead leveled a deceptively cool look at the bronzed man beside her as she forced herself to choke out, “I think we both knew what that night was. I wasn’t going to be that sad cougar chasing after a man who lost interest as soon as he earned his MILF achievement.” 

Any lingering amusement in Rio’s eyes immediately died as his expression seemingly morphed into flinty granite instantaneously at her harsh words. Beth’s attention was riveted to the corded muscles in his neck as he clenched his jaw, struggling not to say the first thoughtless thing that popped in his mind. Before he could overthink it, he found himself saying, “You really think that little of me? Do I strike you as someone who goes around seducing women just to say _I can_?” He shook his head with a disgusted sigh and started to push himself away from her car. 

Without warning, an unexpected flare of panic rushed through her. It was the only explanation she had for why her delicate hand shot out to purposefully grab his fingers before he could move too far away from her. She knew something was different the second their skin made contact. Saying she was scared wasn’t right, even though her pulse was racing the way it did whenever she watched her kids do something a little dangerous for the first time. Beth watched as Rio’s attention dropped to their entwined fingers before he dragged his gaze deliberately up her torso until he was finally staring into her widened blue eyes. Her breath hitched slightly as she caught sight of his eyes in the darkness that cocooned them. His pupils were blown wide, but whether it was from the lack of light surrounding them or something _else_ , she didn’t want to dwell on. 

It took her a full minute to realize he’d asked her a question, forcing her to awkwardly shake her head as she said in a daze, “I’m sorry. Can you repeat that?” 

A lazy smirk crawled across his sinfully tempting lips as he said in a low voice that got her wet embarrassingly quickly, “What are you doing, Elizabeth?”

It was a simple enough question. One she’d probably been asked hundreds of times over the years. Yet, in that moment, she knew as surely as she breathed that what he said wasn’t the same thing as what he was _asking_. She gave him a slightly pleading look, hoping that he would understand her silent cry for help more than she did. Instead of taking pity on her and playing to her perceived weakness like Dean would’ve, Rio just continued looking at her with a charged stoicism that drove her mad. 

When she still hadn’t made any effort to answer his question several minutes later, Rio gave her a look that on anyone else she would’ve thought of as being sad before he gently began to slide his hand out of her grasp. Overtaken by an urgent need to preserve whatever “moment” was happening between them, Beth found herself suddenly blurting out, “Do you want to go get coffee?” 

Rio arched a perfectly amused eyebrow at her abrupt reaction, earning him a petulant pout, which was not nearly as obscured by the darkness of the parking lot as she believed. With the hint of a laugh in his voice, he asked, “Now?” 

Beth struggled not to roll her eyes as she breezily replied, “Yeah, now. Unless you make a habit of having business meetings at 8 am on Saturdays and you need to rest up?” She batted her eyelashes at him, accentuating the flippancy of her comment. 

Cocking his head, he studied her with an intensity she’d only ever experienced with him. As if through visual scrutiny alone, he’d be able to unlock every secret she’d taken pains to hide since she was a little girl. Just the thought that he was that curious about her was alluring in a way that frightened her a little, having spent nearly her entire life fading into the background of other people’s stories. That cryptic smile of his that made her melt returned to his face as he said, “Ok, ma. I know someplace we can go.” 

*****************************************

He periodically checked his rear view mirror to make sure he hadn’t lost her as he started navigating down the side streets that would take them to his loft. Giving her the address would’ve been simpler, but the control freak in him didn’t want her to have unfettered access to his life if he’d misread her. Rio had finally finished the renovations on Marcus’ portion of the loft—he’d be pissed if he didn’t keep the apartment for at least two more years. 

Taking separate cars had the added benefit of giving him space. The more time he spent near her, the more he became convinced that she was a witch. It was the only explanation he could come up with to make sense of his uncharacteristic behavior. Never in a million years would he invite a stranger into his home—hell, there were multiple people who’d worked for him _for years_ that had never been invited to any of his homes. And yet here he was, fourth time ever meeting her, taking her back to his place for what he was highly dubious was going to involve coffee. 

It was the same for how much he let her get away with. He hadn’t lied— _sex_ wasn’t a casual thing for him. There were so many other things to occupy his mind: his multiple businesses, knowing when to flip his game, his real estate ventures, his son. Running around chasing skirt was too much of a distraction from what was actually important. Besides, he was a grown-up. He wasn’t interested in catching a case from a one-night stand whose name he wasn’t even entirely sure he knew. Honestly, other than the handful of times he slept with Dylan after he and Alicia ended things, he hadn’t had sex _with anyone_ other than Elizabeth. It was part of why, as hard as he’d tried, he couldn’t ignore the hurt and the anger he’d felt after she’d ghosted him. 

From the very first time he saw her, he felt a compulsive need to have her attention. Her apparent indifference to the connection he _knew_ she must’ve felt too—if the way she’d responded to him in the bathroom was any indication— _infuriated_ him. Nonetheless, he was still a prideful man. If Elizabeth had no desire to come to him, he damn well wasn’t going to run around Detroit looking for her. As the weeks dragged on without seeing hide nor hair of her, he had almost convinced himself that he’d imagined the connection between them. 

Then he’d seen the commercial with car man. Between immediately recognizing Elizabeth’s ex from the bar and Dags’ sister giving him a valid excuse to go to the dealership, he had taken it as a sign. The universe was providing him with the perfect way of drawing Elizabeth out, if only he could be patient. 

As it usually did, his patience paid off. 

After his first few shipments from Canada flowed through the dealership without incident, Rio had decided to spring his trap for Elizabeth. Knowing that Dean would lap up fake praise for his non-existent accomplishments like a man dying of thirst would chug the first drink he was given without question, Rio stopped by the dealership one night to give the pathetic man a “bonus” for the “great work” he was doing. He’d tossed thirty grand in fake cash on Dean’s desk, and watched his eyes light up like a coke addict with an eightball. To help ensure that her ex would use the money in a way that would actually _get_ her attention, Rio had made sure to casually toss out, “Maybe do something fun for your kids,” to plant the seed in the other man’s brain just before he’d walked out of his office. 

He’d had Eddie follow him for a few days afterward, so he knew about Dean’s spending spree at the Apple Store as soon as it happened. Eddie had barely finished getting out, “It looks like he’s even buying the latest Beats headphones for the six year old,” before Rio hung up on him: he’d known he was going to get her attention. 

The building his loft was located in was in one of his newer properties in a gentrifying part of Detroit. Since Marcus was going to be living with him half the time, he’d made sure to make his current primary residence in one of his safer buildings. The school district wasn’t the greatest, but he hadn’t been super concerned about it. Barring some incredibly unforeseen circumstance, Marcus was never going to set foot in a public school if Rio had anything to say about it. 

He slowed down in front of his building and flashed his lights so that Elizabeth would pull alongside him. When she lowered her passenger side window, he’d said just loud enough for her to hear, “This is me. I’m gonna pull my car into the underground garage. I’ll meet you in the lobby in a couple minutes.” She’d barely finished nodding before he’d pulled ahead of her to circle around to the back of his building. He’d thrown one last look in his rear view mirror as he’d turned the corner and saw her parking her van just up the street from the entrance he’d pointed out. Rio smiled as he took note of the fact that she’d managed to find the one parking spot with the most optimal lighting from the illuminated street lamp. 

Elizabeth’s back was turned to him as he came up the stairs from the garage. Cracking open the door a couple inches, he watched her for a minute as she waited in the lobby. To the unobservant, she probably looked like she was simply waiting for the elevator. He knew better. There was a coiled up energy in the set of her shoulders as she swayed back and forth with the sort of calculated aimlessness he’d recognized in himself more often than he could count when he and a crew were casing a joint. She twisted just enough to one side that he was able to catch sight of her profile. Her eyes were caroming over every inch of the lobby, and in that moment, he felt vindicated. She was assessing the building the same way he first had: judging the state of the decorative crown moulding, wondering if the pressed tin ceiling was original, possibly deciding whether it made more sense to update the paint color to a warm earth tone like ochre or cocoa. Elizabeth wasn’t _impressed_ by the space (although he could tell she appreciated it from the small smile tilting up the corners of her mouth); she was appraising it, imagining how she would improve it if given the chance--just like a boss. 

Pushing the door open further, he gave her a minute to register his presence before he walked up behind her. Leaning close enough for him to be able to smell the faint scent of her face cream on the side of her neck, he didn’t even try to hide the arousal in his voice as he asked more than a little smugly, “See anything you like?” He kept his eyes trained on the vibrating pulse point he could see through her nearly translucent skin as she clearly tried but failed to suppress a full body shiver than ran through her at his words. 

She turned her head just far enough over her shoulder that she had to look up at him from under hooded eyelids, a surprising burst of cool minty freshness tickling his nose as she let out a small exhalation of breath. The wolf that he kept carefully locked within himself howled in delight--he knew Elizabeth wasn’t the type of woman to go popping breath mints only to turn around and immediately start drinking something like coffee. A small part of him was slightly annoyed by the idea that she found him so predictable as to assume he _wasn’t_ taking her to some 24-hour coffee shop out by the interstate, but he knew it was just petulance for the sake of pouting. If anything, a much larger part of him crowed over the fact that despite knowing he had no intention of having some weird type of late-night coffee klatch with her, she followed him all the way over to his apartment anyway. The drive from Boland Motors to his place had taken them at least fifteen minutes--more than enough time for her to change her mind and simply stop following him if she’d wanted. 

The fact that she was here, looking at him with her doe-y bedroom eyes, mouth minty fresh and kissably close, made his cock swell with a renewed urgency. Rio rocked his hips forward a fraction of an inch—just enough for her to feel his burgeoning erection—before stepping away from her. Her disappointed whimper from the loss of his body heat did not go unnoticed as he watched her slowly blink a couple times in shock. Trailing his fingers teasingly along her lower back, he canted his head to the side and said, “Elevators are this way.”

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

They rode the elevator up to the fifth floor in a kind of charged silence. Rio spent the whole brief ride with his back pressed flat against the side of the elevator car gazing at her with the most disconcertingly focused distraction. She imagined it was a force of habit as she took stock of how his eyes never left her, but how his body would imperceptibly tense for a moment every time the elevator “dinged” the announcement of a new floor. It was almost like he expected an ambush to be waiting every time the door _might_ open. As twisted as it was, the inherent danger of being around him that he telegraphed through his body language didn’t scare her the way it ought’ve—instead, she found her breath quickening as an undeniable slickness slowly seeped from her pussy. 

When the doors finally did open on the fifth floor, Rio surprised her by waiting for her to exit the elevator first—even going so far as to hold his arm in front of the retracted doors to make sure they didn’t begin to shut on her. It was such an odd change from Dean. She’d only been alone in an elevator with him a handful of times over the years, which seemed odd when she thought back on it, but they rarely went anywhere by themselves where an elevator was involved. There had been that time after _his_ senior prom when he’d booked a hotel room overlooking the Detroit River. He’d gotten so drunk both before and at the dance with his friends that he’d barely been conscious as she struggled to keep him upright in the elevator, his rented canary yellow polyester cummerbund askew, the wilted daisies in her afterthought of a corsage littering the floor like a sad little flower bomb. Then there was their honeymoon. Dean had promised to surprise her with a “trip dreams are made of.” As they’d started driving east into Canada, Beth had thought they were going to honeymoon in the most traditionally romantic spot of all: Niagara Falls. She’d fallen asleep in the car with dreams of Dean kissing her awake when they arrived at the Falls, the low winter light sparkling off the waterfall mist like tiny suspended diamonds. Instead, she’d woken up after slamming her face into the floor of an elevator. Dean had haphazardly tossed her on a luggage cart when she hadn’t immediately awoken as he’d pulled his car into the parking garage attached to the Red Roof Inn he’d booked them into in Hamilton, Ontario. His sports bag had shifted underneath her poorly distributed weight and she’d immediately been dumped out onto the floor. In retrospect, Beth realized it should’ve been a sign for her to run as far away from her ex as she could get. 

As she’d stepped passed Rio out of the elevator, she realized if she was being completely honest with herself, even when she was sixteen, Dean had _never_ inspired the same type of lustful tension within her simply by _his presence_ the way the man beside her now did. 

Rio surprised her when he didn’t immediately head off toward his apartment. Cutting a glance his way through her bangs, she caught what struck her as a playful challenge in his eyes: he wanted _her_ to figure out which was his apartment. Looking back at the number of doors in the hallway, she only counted four, so she imagined her odds of guessing correctly were pretty high. Her eyes scanned over everything. A recently used drop cloth and a can of what appeared to be ceiling paint were pushed neatly against the wall closest to the first door. The second door still had a flyer hanging on it advertising events from Motor City Pride. Beth slowly kept moving down the hall toward the last two doors. She could feel Rio behind her beaming with something that she couldn’t decide whether it felt more like smugness or pride. 

The two doors at the end of the hall appeared identical in every way. She strained her ears, but there weren’t any sounds coming from behind either door to help her narrow it down. Tossing a challenging look over her shoulder, Rio just looked back at her with a raised eyebrow and a cat-who-ate-the-canary look. Beth exhaled sharply through her nose before turning her attention back to the doors. Thinking back to what little she knew about him, he seemed to like being near enough to the action to observe without being directly in the splash zone, but at the same time, he seemed like he wanted to have as much notice as possible about things coming his way. Taking the two things together, Beth settled on the door at the very end of the hall. As she purposefully approached her chosen door, she couldn’t help the goosebumps that erupted across her skin as Rio practically whispered in her ear, “ _Well done_ , _Elizabeth_.” 

Beth’s senses went haywire as the sinfully attractive man behind her effectively boxed her against his front door as he snaked an arm artfully passed her waist to fit his key in the lock. 

As he ushered her into his home, he flicked a switch by the door, bathing his apartment in soft recessed lighting. Beth stood stock still in the middle of his open floor plan living room as Rio moved into the kitchen. Whatever Beth had been expecting, this wasn’t it. There were paintings on the walls that didn’t look like anything, but that she sensed were probably more expensive than her car. She was sure the wooden sideboard against the far wall was an _actual_ antique, and not merely wood that was artificially distressed to look like an antique. He had a minimalist aesthetic she was downright envious of--to say that he had taken the idea of kondo-ing his life to the extreme appeared to be an understatement. Glancing back at the entrance to his apartment, she noticed a meticulously laid out space for shoes. Even though he still seemed to be wearing his, it was obvious that he generally didn’t want footwear worn around his home. Without thinking about it, she started to slip out of her boots--twenty years of being a fastidious hostess and guest kicking in on instinct. 

When she finished putting her boots in the designated space by the door, she turned around to see Rio watching her with an amused look dancing behind his eyes. She felt a wave of self-consciousness wash over her as he subtly took note of her mismatched socks. Before her embarrassment had a chance to take hold of her over her seeming imperfection sullying his scrupulously curated space, his arousal-tinged voice rang out through the apartment as he drawled, “Yeah, so I forgot to restock my Keurig.” Beth arched a perfectly sculpted eyebrow at his not-at-all-sorry admission. As his almost perpetual smirk graced his face, she found herself wondering aloud, “What am I doing here, Rio?”

Her eyes were glued to his mouth as he chewed on his lip for a second before he began slowly stalking over toward her. He had covered half the distance between them before Beth realized Rio had not only left his shoes on, but he was still wearing his buttery soft hoodie. Beth’s fingers itched to run her hands over every inch of him—clothed or not. 

Whenever she saw him, she found she had a strangely visceral reaction to his clothing. The last way she’d describe his clothing would be flashy or brash—no canary yellow for him—and yet, she’d be lying if she didn’t admit they were eye-catching. Even now, wearing something as casual as a black hoodie with a matching black t-shirt and a pair of obviously well-loved jeans, his clothes fit him like he’d been born to wear them. Dean once told her that “The clothes make the man” after he’d maxed out what remained of their credit card line on an ugly sharkskin suit that he’d proudly worn to Boland Motors every day for two years after making sales manager; however, she was strongly beginning to think that it was _the man_ who made the clothes. 

Beth was so caught up in her silent admiration of Rio’s sartorial choices that he was pushing the one errant lock of hair that never wanted to cooperate for her behind her left ear with his pinky before she realized what he was doing. She looked up at him, her attention wholly focused on the way his lower lip jutted out _just_ so. Before she could overthink it, her hand gripped his shoulder, and she found herself feeling vindicated in her belief about how impossibly soft his hoodie would be, a moment before she captured his lips with her own. 

At first, the kiss was merely a warm press of lips against one another—almost plutonic, really—until it wasn’t. She wasn’t entirely sure what changed—whether it was a slight opening of her lips, inviting his tongue to probe her mouth, or the fractional slide of her hand closer to his neck, the better to caress his warm tawny skin—but in the space of a heartbeat, their mouths were consuming each other as they fought for dominance. When Beth tilted her head a little more to the side, Rio took full advantage of the new cant of her parted lips to tease the inside of her mouth with his tongue. He tested her with fleeting flicks and swirls until he secured a small frustrated whimper from her, at which point he artfully slid the rest of his tongue in her mouth. When he pulled his tongue back to tease her again with his little serpentine mouth-to-mouth game, she bit his unfairly tempting lower lip, earning her a warning growl. 

**********************************************

Rio’s hand found her breast at almost the same moment as Elizabeth’s hand finally made contact with his neck. It felt like a circuit closing, only the electricity powered his cock. It had been so long since he’d touched her like this, he’d forgotten how well the heavy fullness of her breasts felt in his hands as he kneaded them. As he reverently massaged her generous globe with his left hand, he slowly moved them both across his apartment by keeping his right hand on her hip as he guided her backwards toward his bed. His thumb absently brushed over her erect nipple through her clothes. The innocent full-throated mewl of _need_ it earned him effectively morphed his throbbing cock into a flesh-covered piece of rebar. 

He vaguely recognized the whispering metallic sound of the zipper on his hoodie being lowered once he’d managed to move them close enough to his bed not to completely litter his apartment with their discarded clothing. Rio let out a slightly feral groan in response—up until that moment, his brain had not fully appreciated the fact that _this_ time when he fucked her, he’d actually be to _see_ her body, to feel more of her tauntingly soft skin, _to mark_ _her as his own_. Her delicate hands were pushing open the sides of his hoodie with an insistency that warmed a part of his soul. He knew he was a great lover (no one had ever genuinely accused him of modesty), but knowing how to arouse someone’s body to the point of madness was simply a matter of biology—understanding how the body’s pleasure sensors worked. The urgency in Elizabeth’s actions wasn’t a natural by-product of his own efforts to seduce her though—he simply hadn’t touched her enough to chalk up her reactions to biochemical impulses. No, despite her months of radio silence, Elizabeth had _craved_ him as much as he had ached for her. 

He felt the blunt scratch of her nails along his biceps as she pushed his jacket down his arms and he let out a small hiss. Elizabeth pulled away from him with a jerk, giving him an odd look that was part apologetic concern and part naked lust. Rio just grinned as he took stock of the incongruous image of her lust-blown blue eyes, bee stung lips, and blushing cheeks matched with the deepening worry crease forming in her forehead over the thought that she’d legitimately hurt him in her eagerness to undress him. The longer he smirked at her in silence, the more her self-consciousness seemed to ratchet up until he could just about see the ingrained urge to apologize forming on her lips. Right as she’d dropped her gaze from his to focus her attention on her adorably mismatched socks, he leaned over and said in an arousal-roughened voice against the shell of her ear, “Don’t be like that, _ma_ . It’s ok. Just next time?” He deliberately paused until she looked back up at him and he knew he had her full attention. As he held her gaze, there was no mistaking the blooming fear in her eyes, and he suddenly wanted nothing more than to beat the shit out of her ex for whatever he’d done to make her feel guilty about her exuberant passion. Rio didn’t even try to suppress the full extent of his lust as he growled, “ _Do it harder, Elizabeth_.” 

Whatever fear had started bleeding into her bewitching blue eyes instantly evaporated as her pupils blew so wide from desire that they crowded out most of her irises. He had less than a second to appreciate the change in her demeanor before she launched herself back at his lips, her enthusiastic hands simultaneously scrambling to undo his belt. Rio smiled against her lips as he slowed her hands down long enough for him to tug at the hem of her thinning cotton t-shirt, pulling it off her in a surprisingly fluid motion. Their lips detached again as he took a step back so he could better admire Elizabeth’s body.

A flush crept down the graceful column of her neck, spreading out across her collarbone like an oil slick, giving her skin an alluring strawberries and cream appearance. As his eyes continued traveling down the length of her torso, he was caught off guard by the vibrant royal blue jewel tone of her satin bra. The color was amazing on her, but he wasn’t expecting such a bold choice given how otherwise subdued her own t-shirt-and-jeans look was. Elizabeth blushed even harder under his scrutiny and began moving her arms to cover up her ample bosom when he stopped her with a firm hand on her left wrist. He continued staring at her with quiet reverence before he whispered, “Nah, ma, _no lo hagas. Eres hermosa_.” 

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

The soft, lyrical quality of Rio’s voice as he said something she imagined was in Spanish sent an unexpected tingle up her spine. For the first time in years she regretted not keeping up with the three years of it she took in high school. She suddenly found herself more than a little embarrassed to admit her Spanish began and ended with: “ _hóla_ ” (perpetually ingrained in her mind in Dean’s dismissive eighteen year-old voice pronouncing it ‘HOLE-LAHs’), “ _adíos_ ,” and “ _Dondé esta la bibliotheca_?” (thanks to Annie). 

Beth peeked up at him through the veil of her bangs and saw a tenderness in his eyes that caught her off guard. Ignoring her inner cynic, she decided to take a chance and trust that Rio wasn’t interested in sleeping with her merely out of some fetishistic motivation—that he actually was attracted _to her_. Holding his gaze, she slowly brought one forearm up to keep her bra pressed against her chest as she used her free hand to unhook her brightly colored lingerie. After the hook and eye closures released with three barely audible clicks, she used her free hand again to slide each of her bra straps teasingly off her shoulders and down her arms. When she finished shrugging off the brightly-colored elastic, she finally moved her forearm, letting her bra flutter to the floor on top of his black hoodie, completely revealing her engorged teats to his hungry gaze. As Rio stood there drinking in her topless body, Beth felt more exposed than she ever had in her life. The feeling both thrilled and terrified her. 

The longer she stood there on display for him, the more anxious she became for something to do with her hands. Eventually, she stepped up next to him again and reached for his impossibly soft, black cotton t-shirt. Unlike her earlier attempt to take off his pants, when she tugged up the hem of his shirt, she did it with the same deliberateness Rio had taken with her own. As each inch of his perfectly toned chest was revealed, Beth felt her mouth get drier and drier. There was an undeniable magnetism about Rio that compelled her to be near him. Under the same guise of taking his shirt off, she slowly circled around to his back. She pressed her sensitive breasts against the warm skin between his shoulder blades as she stood on her tiptoes to finish pulling his shirt over his out stretched arms. As she lowered her heels back to the floor, Beth’s pebbled nipples dragged tortuously down his back causing her to let out an undeniable whimper of need. When her feet were finally planted back on the ground, Beth found herself leaning against Rio’s torso as her arms snaked around his waist, feeding her need for more skin contact. 

Although outwardly Rio appeared calm, she knew better. She could feel him practically vibrate from the coiled spring of tension within him. Impulsively, she found herself feathering his back with kisses. They started off as small simple presses of her lips to his skin, but as she became more confident in herself, they morphed into more aggressive nips and bites as she relished the almost inaudible hisses and groans Rio made every time he felt the sharp sting of her teeth. 

*************************************************

Elizabeth was a witch. There was no other explanation for the way his body responded to her. His cock throbbed more fiercely than it ever had in his life as her teeth pulled at his flesh with increasing roughness. What finally pushed him over the edge though were her fingertips. Whether she realized it or not, her hands had drifted down the sides of his torso until the soft pads of her fingers were teasing the delicate skin on his hip bones as they drifted back and forth in feather-light caresses along the small strip of skin between where the edge of his boxer-briefs met the waistband of his jeans. The dichotomy of her soft hands and her sharp teeth simultaneously playing with his body broke what little self-restraint he’d been holding on to. 

Rio spun around so quickly Elizabeth’s fingers never even had a chance to clear the denim of his pants before his mouth descended on hers again, this time in a voraciously passionate kiss. When she renewed her previously redirected efforts to remove his pants, this time he did nothing to stop her, although her efforts were made somewhat more complicated by his own impatient efforts to remove her jeans at the same time. He grinned against her mouth when her hands suddenly stilled as he deftly popped open her button fly and purposefully pulled her zipper down with determined fingers. An undeniably moist heat radiated from her pussy as he pushed her jeans open, making it infinitely easier to peel her pants off. Nipping at her lower lip, Rio couldn’t help but tease, “Why, Elizabeth, I’d almost think you _missed_ me,” his voice trailing off as he briefly dropped his hand down the front of her splayed jeans to cup her satin-covered mound before smoothly running his right hand back over her bared thigh to push the denim further down her legs. 

A moment later, Rio groaned as Elizabeth’s hand lightly ran down the denim-clad length of his erection before giving his prominent bulge a tentative squeeze. He kneaded her luscious ass cheeks—the cheeky cut of her underwear doing little to deny him direct access to her skin—until he was nearly certain she was going to have fingertip-shaped bruises littering her pale skin later. Her jeans were still only halfway over the curvy slope of her thighs when he said with an impatient grunt, “Take off your pants and get on my bed.” The small whimper that escaped her slightly parted lips as she gave her hips a small shimmy causing the loosened denim to drop unceremoniously to the floor fueled the urgency in his hands as he made short work of tearing open his belt and pulling down his zipper, letting his pants join the increasingly large pile of clothes on his otherwise pristine floor as he simultaneously toed off his sneakers. Although he felt himself inwardly cringe at how roughly he was treating his clothing, any distraction that might’ve been from the woman on his bed was short-lived. When he turned his attention back to her, he saw Elizabeth had propped herself up on one elbow as she reached out for the waistband of his underwear with her other hand, deftly slipping her slim fingers between the elastic and his skin, tugging at him until he crawled onto the bed with her. 

++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

There was something decidedly predatory about him that she knew on an instinctual level should’ve terrified her as Rio caged in her exposed body, his hands planted firmly above her shoulders, his knees pinned on either side of her thighs...and the perfectly suburban PTA mom in her was. However, the small flicker of Elizabeth _Marks_ that always seemed to flare to life around this man was very much _not_ terrified. _That_ Beth found herself squeezing her thighs together in an attempt to find any kind of relief for her increasingly throbbing pussy as she gently chewed on her bottom lip and tried to contain her compulsive urge to trace her fingers over each of Rio’s previously hidden tattoos. 

She didn’t realize she’d been clenching his comforter in her balled up fists until the enticing sound of his hypnotic voice drew her attention back to his face when he said patiently, “Elizabeth, you’re naked in my bed. You don’t need permission to touch me, _mamí_.” 

A small nervous laugh escaped her as mortification flooded through her. She was a mother of four—it wasn’t as if she didn’t understand how sex worked—it was more that sex with Dean had never been particularly inspiring. He’d never liked it when she’d used her teeth or her nails on him. Hell, he’d even told her once that if she touched him _at all_ he lost his concentration because he was so focused on whether she was going to tickle him. (She’d done it _once,_ when she was seventeen, and he’d never let her forget it.) Beth imagined that’s what made it so easy for him to cheat—he didn’t care that he was having sex _with her_ so long as he had a warm body to stick his dick into. (As she’d learned during their divorce proceedings, getting something like a fleshlight to address his “unmet needs” was “beneath him” because he had “some standards.” She’d had such a dissociative reaction to his explanation that her attorney actually thought she’d had a stroke.) 

Rio’s encouragement, and damn near _insistence_ , that she actively participate in their intimacy—not to mention that he honestly seemed _turned on_ by her aggressiveness rather than repulsed—overwhelmed her. He was staring so intently into her widened blue eyes that she was able to easily watch as his humor morphed into concern before bleeding into disbelief until he settled on what she thought was resignation. Her arousal started to shrivel as he rolled to the side and she dropped her eyes to her chest, waiting for him to inevitably kick her out for failing to meet his expectations. 

Instead, he surprised her by taking the hand closest to his leg in his own and guiding it to rest on his right pec as he laid on his side watching her. Her eyes shot back to his face to see a small, but genuine, smile fluttering around his mouth. His chest pressed further against her palm as he leaned closer to whisper, “See? I’m not made of glass, Elizabeth. You’re not going to break me.” 

Although she knew he was telling the truth from a physical standpoint, it still didn’t address the twenty-odd year legacy of Dean repeatedly telling her in every way imaginable that she just wasn’t enjoyable to sleep with. She absently stroked his chest, focusing her attention just to the side of his neck, as she said a little sadly, “I just want to make sure you enjoy it.” 

Beth was focusing so hard on keeping her attention away from Rio’s face that she nearly missed the low, rapid, angry-sounding muttering he was doing in Spanish. Taking that as her cue to leave, she dropped her hand from his warm chest and started rolling to her side in order to get off the bed. She made it as far as turning her back to him when she heard him say darkly, “Just where you think you going, ma?” Even though there was nothing inherently threatening about his question, something about the way he asked it made her think twice about simply ignoring him. Beth turned her head just far enough over her shoulder to see Rio’s eyes before she said, “I thought you wanted me to leave.”

For the briefest second, she could’ve sworn she saw something like disappointment bleed into the lust and anger she saw battling in his expression before he captured her gaze and said distinctly, “Did I say that?”

There was a challenge in his eyes that goaded the part of her that was still the grand-theft-auto-committing Elizabeth Marks—not the perfectly complacent housewife Beth Boland—and without thinking, she found herself snapping back, “I don’t know. I don’t remember _Señora_ Aldrich covering whatever you just said in Tenth Grade Spanish.” 

The words had barely left her mouth when she abruptly found herself being flipped over on to her back again. She had enough time to let out a small “oof” as she slightly bounced against his mattress, and then Rio’s lips attacked hers. Unlike their earlier kiss, whose urgency had mostly been fueled by a lust born of desire and proximity, the kiss they shared now was bred out of dominance and sheer will. Beth wasn’t entirely sure how--magic, perhaps--but the man on top of her had turned her body into a tuning fork of vibrating need. Everything about him was sending her brain into sensory overload. His lips were relentless as they moved over hers in perfect harmony, only allowing her the most fleeting of seconds to gasp for breath before pulling her under again with his tongue in her mouth and his teeth drawing on her increasingly abused lower lip. She writhed shamelessly against him as his right hand desperately kneaded her full breasts, squeezing the heavy fullness of each tit before teasing her stiffened nipples with his deft fingers, pinching and tugging on them until she wanted to beg for mercy from his sweet torture. The final straw for her sanity though was the slow, deliberate grinding of his hips. Unlike the almost chaotic actions of his mouth and his hands, each of his pelvic thrusts was perfectly calculated so that he was building up the coiled tension in her pussy with every stroke, while simultaneously withholding _just enough_ to have her whimpering in wild desperation as she tried chasing after the taunting crest of orgasmic bliss. 

Aside from setting every blessed nerve-ending in her body on fire from wanton desire, Rio’s masterful onslaught had successfully freed her mind from overthinking what she wanted allowing her to act purely on need, without having Dean’s whingy judgment hanging over her like a black cloud. She needed something to do with her hands to keep her body anchored to this world? Her blind need encouraged her to simply score up Rio’s back with her nails as she clutched desperately at his skin seeking any kind of purchase. 

By the time Rio began kissing and biting the delicate skin of Beth’s neck, the ache in her pussy was nearly unbearable. Unfortunately, since Dean had actively _dis_ couraged her from giving voice to her sexual needs whenever they’d had sex, she couldn’t bring herself to do anything to express her increasing frustration other than whimpering with greater desperation as she tried rocking her barely covered pussy more forcefully against the cotton barrier of his straining cock. Suddenly, there was a slight sting against her left earlobe as Rio worried it a little with his teeth before he teased, “There something you needed, Elizabeth?” 

Between the torturous ministrations of his body and the gravelly, lust-tinged timbre of his voice, Beth was so wet that her arousal was cloying the air despite the fact that she was still wearing her satin panties. When she still hadn’t answered him a couple minutes later, he nuzzled against a spot behind her ear that she never knew had the power to make her pant with lust, leaving her to keen loudly with frustration. Instead of taking pity on her, Rio murmured smugly against her neck, “Uh-uh, ma, you want something, you need to use your words.” Beth wasn’t entirely sure who was more impressed by the feral growl she let loose in response--him or her. Despite that, he still continued to tease her body, lightly running over her breasts with feathery touches, periodically dragging his mildly calloused palms over her increasingly sensitized nipples. 

In a moment of desperate inspiration, her brain out of the blue called up the memory of some cheesy porn Dean had tricked her into watching with him after Jane was born in an attempt to “get her in the mood.” While most of the movie had been forgettable, she found herself awkwardly parroting one of the cookie-cutter blonde, large-breasted “actresses” as she practically whispered, “Please make me cum.” Rio’s entire body froze while he backed far enough away from her to look deeply into her lust-blown pupils. He studied her closely for a minute before he asked evenly, “What was that? I don’t think I quite heard you, Elizabeth.”

A small huff of air escaped her nose as she shot the beginnings of a glare at him. “Please,” she repeated slightly louder, “make me cum.” Her jaw clenched as he looked at her coolly for a moment before he responded nonchalantly, “Nah, I don’t think so.” 

She wasn’t entirely certain what pushed her over the edge-- _what_ he said, or the _manner_ in which he said it--all she knew was that she was fed up with his taunting bullshit as she growled threateningly, “Goddamnit, Rio! Make me cum or I’ll do it my fucking self.” On the off chance he thought she was kidding, Beth went to move her right hand incrementally closer to the molten inferno of her pussy when she felt his fingers wrap firmly around her wrist, immobilizing her hand. 

If Beth had to hazard a guess, she was pretty sure she _felt_ rather than heard Rio’s guttural command, “ _Don’t_.” The thing she knew was indisputable though was that one minute his sinewy fingers were circled around her like a shackle, and the next his hand had expertly ghosted down the length of her torso until his right index and middle fingers were effortlessly sliding knuckle-deep into her obscenely wet channel. 

***********************************************

‘ _Díos te salve, María. Llena eres de gracía…’_ Rio let the words of the Hail Mary run through the back of his mind to keep him from doing something embarrassingly stupid—like cumming all over his underwear because he couldn’t believe how sexy the woman he was finger-fucking was. Even though she wasn’t wearing a thong like the first time they’d had sex, the crotch on her cheeky panties had still been easy enough for him to move aside for him to slip his fingers inside her. He was amazed. There was no mistaking how tight her pussy was: Elizabeth had definitely stayed on top of her kegels or some shit. Nonetheless, he’d faced little resistance when inserting his lengthy digits into her because of how amazingly wet she’d gotten from their fooling around, and the knowledge that he could make her _that_ aroused fueled his ego spectacularly. Crooking his fingers just so, he easily found the quarter-sized spongy spot that he recognized as her G-spot and began stroking it with varying degrees of pressure. 

Everything about the way Elizabeth responded to him was fascinating: the way her pussy clenched down harder on his fingers as he built up the pressure in her cunt, how her hips would periodically jump when his thumb would casually press on her clit through the ineffective satin barrier of her scrunched up panties, even the way her skin bloomed a deep crimson whenever she felt the occasional wisps of his breath against her neck. What captured his attention the most though was how quiet she was. No matter how much he made her body writhe and twitch and shudder from pleasure, the most sound he could get out of her were small sighs and barely audible yips as he drew her closer and closer to the edge of orgasmic freefall. He hadn’t thought much about it in the bar bathroom, subconsciously attributing her relative silence to their location. Given the obvious deep wells of passion within her though, now that he was able to study her, it struck him as odd that she felt the need to restrict the more obvious signs of her sexuality. 

The thought occurred to him that Elizabeth was a nearly silent lover for no other reason than she’d never been with anyone more than once who actually _cared_ whether _she_ found sex fulfilling. Once he thought it, it seemed obvious—if you didn’t know what _good_ sex was supposed to feel like, you didn’t know how your body should respond, so you had no idea of how to tell your partner how to make it good for you. If your partner was selfish and ignorant like the car man, he wouldn’t realize that their sex was one-sided in his favor, and he wouldn’t care enough to make sure that fucking _was_ good for her. By the time she probably started exploring her own body, she’d likely reached the sad conclusion that voicing any opinion about her own pleasure, or lack thereof, was irrelevant, so she just didn’t bother. 

His reaction to the conclusion he’d reached was visceral and immediate. Working his hand more forcefully against her clit and her G-spot, Rio leaned closer to her ear and purred, “You don’t gotta be shy, ma.” His dropped half an octave lower. “I _wanna_ make sure I’m making this good for you.”

A long moment of relative silence stretched between them--the only sounds in the room the occasional wet squelch from Rio’s pumping fingers, and some soft intermittent squeaks from Elizabeth. The more carefully Rio listened to her though, the more he began to pick up that her noises were taking on a more plaintive, frustrated quality. Pressing a firm kiss against the top of her shoulder blade, he breathed against her soft skin, “ _Tell me what you need, Elizabeth_.” From his proximity, he heard her swallow down a small sob, before hearing her broken voice quietly say, “Please, Rio. My clit. More.” 

With five short words, he knew exactly what she needed. Between the satin and how wet he’d managed to get her, rubbing his thumb over her clit _through_ her underwear wasn’t creating enough friction to do much beyond driving her mad with frustration. Taking pains for the moment not to dislodge his occupied hand, he leaned his torso far enough back from her so he could easily see her face before he asked, “You fond of these panties?”

Elizabeth looked at him quizzically for a second before she replied in a half-daze, “Well...they’re new-ish.” 

Satisfied that the underwear he’d partially shoved aside held no special sentimental value to her, he muttered, “I’ll replace them,” before he temporarily extricated his hand from her pussy to steady the thin material while he violently yanked on the strip of fabric resting against her hip with his other hand. A sharp screeching noise filled his apartment as the flimsy barrier rended in two followed shortly thereafter by Elizabeth’s shocked, breathlessly voice crying out his name in admonishment. He gave her a brief unapologetic half-shrug in response before replacing his dislodged fingers back inside her pussy with ease as his thumb pressed directly against the tender flesh of her clit. Her hips jerked violently in response while the former note of censure in her voice quickly morphed into a deep, satisfied moan of unbridled _want_. 

Without the aid of the silken barrier to mute the demanding friction of his slightly calloused thumb pad, she shamelessly rocked her pussy against his talented hand with increasing fervor as her appreciative moans become incrementally louder with every other thrust. Within about three minutes of tearing off her panties, Rio heard Elizabeth’s crystalline voice cry out, “ _Oh, Rio!_ ” a second before her pussy clamped down so hard on his fingers that he heard the distinctive “popping” sound of one of his knuckles cracking. 

He grinned with smug pride as he eventually slipped his two fingers out of her fluttering cunt, watching as her thighs fell open invitingly while she waited for her racing heart to slow down. 

++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

Beth’s head fell heavily to the side as an intoxicating liquid warmth suffused every inch of her body. Even with a fresh set of AAs, she’d never managed to achieve quite such an intense orgasm. She lazily rolled her head to the other side so she could thank Rio. As she looked up at him through the veil of her bangs though, her mouth went dry.

His normally dark eyes were nearly black with arousal as she watched him fastidiously lick each of the fingers he’d been pumping in and out of her pussy. Beth had never seen something quite so erotic in her life. Her pussy clenched hard enough to send a full body shiver through her. She fleetingly wondered if she tasted any good. Dean had stopped going down on her some time after she had Emma, and the few times he’d bothered to finger her before sex had only involved her clit and he’d usually wipe whatever small amount of moisture he’d manage to elicit from her off on her leg or their sheets as he unceremoniously shoved his dick in her. She’d never bothered to taste herself either since there was just something about sticking her vibrator in her mouth that squicked her out. 

She nibbled on the corner of her lip for a second as she contemplated the pros and cons of what she was considering. Although her mind tried frantically to provide her with a thousand reasons not to ask, she kept circling back to one immutable fact: _Rio wasn’t Dean_. Since she met him, he’d never once made fun of her for any perceived “flaws,” nor had he belittled things she wanted as “unimportant.” If anything, time and again he’d tried to encourage her agency, made it clear to her that there was no shame in speaking up and requesting things. Dropping her eyes to the opposite side of the bed, she swallowed once to lubricate her mouth before saying in a small voice, “Do I taste good?”

Rio’s reaction startled her. There was a light scraping against the delicate skin on the side of her breast that felt similar to when she’d rubbed her fingers over fine grit sandpaper. When she turned her attention to the source of the friction, she saw Rio gently running his neatly maintained facial hair over her sensitive skin and watched him grin when he saw her nipples pull up into hardened peaks. Without taking his eyes off her nipple, he sucked the taut point into the warm recess of his mouth until she let out a deep appreciative groan at his actions. Instinctively, she raked her fingernails over his closely cropped hair as she held him closer to her breast while he suckled on her. She was amazed when she began to feel the now familiar tingle begin again in her pussy when the vibrations from the muffled moan she’d induced in Rio worked their way through her chest. 

For a moment, Beth forgot she’d even asked Rio a question, so caught up was she in the way his rhythmic sucking seemed to have a direct line tied to her pussy that tightened with every pull of his sinful lips. Then, he nipped her, his teeth clenching down _just enough_ on her sensitive bud to skirt the fine line between erotic and painful. Her back bowed from the unexpected sensation, and she could feel his shameless grin against her skin. She dragged her nails down the slope of his skull and the line of his neck to his shoulders so forcefully that she was sure there’d be welts. Instead of the angry “What the hell, Beth?!” that she was anticipating though, Rio simply growled as he popped his head up from her chest to look her in the eyes. 

The roiling lust swirling around in the warm chocolate of his eyes both terrified her with its intensity and rapidly turned the tingle in her pussy back into a deep throbbing ache. If not for the undeniable magnetism of his gaze, Beth was certain she would’ve looked away in embarrassment when her brain finally processed Rio’s voice saying, “Yeah, you taste good, ma. That was more like a snack though. I’m still hungry.” His gravelly voice died off as he allowed the implication of his words to seep into her, and she once again felt the teasing scrape of his facial hair as he dragged his mouth down the valley between her breasts until he was littering open-mouthed kisses across the soft plane of her abdomen. Her body was going so haywire from all the competing sensations he was inducing in her that Beth didn’t realize entirely what he meant until he placed an almost chaste kiss right to the side of her belly button before nibbling gently on her hipbone. 

Overcome with panic, Beth tried to push herself up to her elbows and she said a little breathlessly, “Umm, it’s ok. You don’t have to worry about that...about doing that, I mean.”

She was prepared for a lot of reactions: _relief_ being chief amongst them. Mirth, however, was not on her list. His eyes positively _sparkled_ with amusement as he casually propped his chin on her hip, his mouth temptingly close to her eager pussy, as he replied easily, “Oh, I ain’t.” Beth released a tense breath she didn’t realize she’d been holding only to hear Rio follow up with, “I do something you don’t enjoy, you tell me. Otherwise, I wanna feel you ride my tongue with your cunt.” 

The unexpected crudeness of his word choice caught her off guard enough that her “mom brain” kicked in instinctively as she chastised “ _Language_!” before she could stop herself. He chuckled for a second before he gave her yet another unapologetic smirk and amended himself with, “Oh, I’m sorry, ma. I meant to say, I’m gonna eat you out until you can’t remember your name. That better?”

Her overloaded brain had just enough time for her to think ‘ _Oh_ ’ before she felt the unmistakable sensation of a hot, eager tongue lapping at her pussy-- _his_ hot, eager tongue. 

Any delusions she had of possessing a fully functional mind shrivelled up as all her higher-order processing hid in the face of her all-consuming baser instincts. 

There was an unquestionable confidence that radiated off the man entrenched between her thighs as she found herself writhing in time with each firm lick and teasing flick of his tongue. Her left arm flailed erratically for a moment before she finally managed to move her hand up to her mouth, her teeth biting into the fleshy piece of skin where the base of her thumb flowed into the heel of her palm. Despite her teeth digging even more sharply into her hand with each passing moment, Beth’s stifled moans of pleasure got louder. And then, just like that, Rio stopped. 

His head popped up from her pussy like a prairie dog checking for danger, and she was amazed that he didn’t spontaneously combust from the heat of her glare. Beth surprised herself with the frustrated anger that bled into her growl as she seethed, “ _Why’d you stop_?”

There was an odd sort of obscenity to the scene before her as he looked up with artificially innocent eyes while his mouth and chin positively _glistened_ from all the honeyed arousal he’d wrung from her as she’d brazenly humped his mouth. Rio shrugged as much as he could with his shoulders pinned under her thighs before he replied nonchalantly, “I wasn’t sure you were enjoying it.”

The spark of mischief in his eyes along with her well-honed “Mom-calls-bullshit-o-meter” told her he was toying with her, but she still couldn’t stop herself from rising to the bait. In a more mature echo of one of Danny and Emma’s endless “are so/am not” arguments, she found herself uselessly counterarguing, “I _was_ enjoying it. Immensely.”

His mischievous look easily morphed into his damn near perpetual smirk as he countered with, “Yeah, see, I don’t so, ma.” 

Every nerve in her body was on fire from her abruptly cutoff pleasure. It was the only explanation she could think of for why she found herself saying with more than a hint of dark challenge in her voice, “Get your goddamn tongue back in my pussy _now_ , Rio, and make me fucking cum before I just do it myself.” 

He arched one impressed eyebrow at her outburst before taking his sweet time to comply with her demand. Fed up with his stalling, Beth soon found her right hand flying to the top of his head as she pressed down on his skull, canting her hips up to meet his lips halfway. Despite putting all her strength into her push, she barely moved him a quarter of an inch. She let out a frustrated noise that sounded vaguely like a feral cat getting into a fight with a raccoon, which would’ve mortified her under different circumstances. As it was though, her brain had been hijacked like an addict looking to score, and all she could focus on was her desperate need to orgasm. Her eyes drifted back to Rio’s face. The self-satisfied look plastered all over his countenance was too much to bear. With an annoyed huff and an eye roll even her sister Annie would’ve been impressed by, Beth ran her nails lightly down the side of his head before turning her touch into a lingering caress of his cheek. He leaned into her comforting touch for just a fraction of a fraction of a second before she dropped her hand from his feverish skin to the apex of her thighs. 

If not for the fact she’d been watching his face so intensely from the minute he’d interrupted her oral pleasure, she was positive she would’ve missed the possessive way Rio momentarily looked at her pussy before his eyes resumed their normal impassivity. 

Her fingertips had nearly dipped inside her pussy to touch her engorged clit when his gruff voice asked, “What exactly do you think you’re doing, Elizabeth?” Even though his tone was even, there was a bar of barely contained tension in his shoulders that she could feel thrumming through the backs of her thighs. Mirroring his cool detachment, she replied, “Finishing what you apparently couldn’t,” as she inched her fingers slightly closer to where she so desperately needed them. 

Beth had never seen anyone move as fast as Rio did in that moment outside of a superhero movie. One minute she could feel the warm velvety heat of her pussy at the edge of her fingertips, the next her wrist was being pinned down perpendicular to her hip by the younger man’s unrelenting grip. Just as she was opening her mouth to parrot his own words back to him, she felt his tongue expertly probing her channel again, and what she was on the verge of saying immediately morphed into a much louder, appreciative “ _Oh sweet Jesus, yes!_ ” 

*****************************************

Rio’s lips twitched against the meticulously waxed lips of Elizabeth’s pussy. The sacrilegious part of him wanted to pass a quip about how the Almighty wasn’t there, but _he’d_ be more than happy to take His credit, but the larger part of him didn’t want to waste any more time with his mouth being occupied by anything other than the unique heady tanginess that was Elizabeth’s distinctive essence. As fun as it was to tease her, hearing her scream his name was going to be much, much more satisfying. ‘Besides,’ he found himself thinking as an afterthought, ‘there was no way Jesus ever tasted something as sweet as her or the Bible would be a whole lot thinner.’ 

His fingers absentmindedly stroked the responsive skin on the underside of her pinned down wrist eliciting a twitchy, full body shiver from her. Even though he wasn’t normally a fan of these types of dominance games in bed, with her, he found he couldn’t stop himself. There was something about the way that she seemed conditioned to let people walk all over her even though _he_ knew she had the makings of a boss that was like a scab he couldn’t help but pick. He felt compelled to push and push her until she eventually snapped and pushed back. 

If he was being perfectly honest with himself, he couldn’t remember the last time he had so much fun with a woman either in or out of bed. A stray thought crossed his mind wondering if this was how the energy between Dags and Carla felt to them. 

A frustrated whimper brought his renewed focused back to the sexy redhead in front of him, and he put his tongue back to work with gusto. He examined her with deep, exploratory swipes--his taste buds becoming insatiable for her special umami flavor. While he knew Elizabeth enjoyed his confident licks, if the way her pussy periodically clamped down around his tongue was any indication, what he found her particularly receptive to was a combination of fleeting brushes directly against her clit combined with some firm suction. As he sucked with increasing vigor, he felt her hand pressing against the back of his head forcing him closer to where she needed him most as she started grinding her pelvis against his mouth harder and harder. His own knee jerk reaction to being held down so forcibly was to struggle, violently, but he quickly quashed the impulse. He was in his own home and Elizabeth posed no threat to him, he reminded himself, silently. Instead of thinking about the surprisingly strong pressure on the back of his head, he forced himself to focus on the sounds he was eliciting from the unpredictable woman above him. Each movement of his tongue elicited a new response. A flick earned him a breathy “ _Oh Rio_ ….” Some particularly vigorous sucking induced a throaty “ _Fuck YES!_ ” Adding a finger inside her pussy as he swirled the tip of his tongue around her clit warranted him “ _Oh sweet Jesus, Rio...Just like that! DON’T STOP!_ ” Within moments, her hips popped up with dramatic force as her torso shook violently with jerky full-body spasms; the walls of her pussy clenching erratically at his tongue as he worked her through her orgasm. He kept relentlessly licking even after her thighs slipped off his shoulders in a dead limp until he eventually felt Elizabeth weakly pushing at his forehead, saying in a pleading whimper, “N’ mor’, Rio. N’ mor’.” 

++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

Beth had never experienced multiple orgasms during sex before, and certainly never from a man who was still wearing his underwear throughout it all. If not for the way that he’d shamelessly delayed letting her orgasm, she’d have been tempted to call him a selfless lover; however, _somehow_ , deep in her soul, she knew better. No, Rio had repeatedly brought her to orgasm without letting himself go with her just so she knew he could, so that there would be no doubt in her mind that he was a far superior lover than her ex-husband and his current business partner. If not for the fact that she was mildly annoyed about being roped into some ridiculous one-sided pissing contest with Dean, she would’ve told Rio that there was never any competition in her mind--their little sexscapade at the bar certainly cemented that for her. As it was, she was content to lay bonelessly in his bed, letting the younger man bask in his redundant victory. 

She was still silently assessing whether feeling had returned to her extremities when the man responsible for her near catatonic state crawled gracefully back up the length of her body, his constrained erection leaving a sizeable damp spot on the front of his charcoal boxer-briefs as it strained desperately against the unfairly soft barrier. For the first time in _years_ , Beth felt herself get excited about the prospect of going down on a man. 

When she and Dean had first started dating, Beth had admittedly preferred giving head to having sex if solely for the reason that she knew she wouldn’t get knocked up. With the absolute shitshow of her home life--between her drunk, clinically depressed mom, and effectively raising Annie and running their household single-handedly--an unexpected pregnancy, was _categorically_ not something she could afford to deal with on so many levels. Then, after they got married, but before they had Kenny, she still rather enjoyed performing blowjobs, if only because she knew all the tricks for making Dean cum in five minutes or less (ten max, if she was tired), and she knew he’d fall into a deep sex-coma afterwards and leave her relatively undisturbed for the rest of the night. Something changed after the kids though. With Kenny and Emma, every time she thought about doing it, her mind would put the kibosh on her plans by reminding her of how often she kissed their children, and she’d just feel _dirty_ . Even after Danny was born, she’d still find herself willing to do it--usually because it was a special occasional, but sometimes just because it was a Tuesday and she was feeling frisky. By the time Jane was born though, she’d just about lost all interest. At first, she chalked it up to her post-partum, but even after her pregnancy-related depression resolved itself, she still felt cold to the idea. If was only after hearing more of her sister’s “morning after” stories than she’d ever care to hear from anyone, ever, that she finally realized why she’d lost all interest-- _Dean_ had stopped putting in any effort: to their limited lovemaking, to their relationship, hell, even to his appearance. It was only after coming to that realization that she’d recognized that, in her own way, she’d subconsciously responded in kind. 

Using more effort than she was expecting, she rolled over on to her side, mirroring Rio’s pose--minus being propped on her elbow, her arms still weren’t up to that level of cooperation. Even with a side perspective, the unobstructed view of his body was mouthwatering. The planes of his torso were lightly defined, but not like he was carrying stubborn pockets of fat, more like he preferred to keep a lean, wiry build like a swimmer or a boxer. He was confident enough in himself not to need to bulk up so he could posture around other men. As she stared at his chest longer, she realized she was surprised by how smooth it was, the only things decorating his skin being his various other tattoos. She found herself half wondering if he waxed, or if he was naturally so hairless. The thought that he might actually wax his chest then got her to thinking about whether he “manscaped” (a term she only had a passing familiarity with thanks again to Annie and a plethora of grocery store check-out line magazine racks). Just the thought of not having to worry about picking pubic hairs out of her teeth was beginning to get her wet again much to her shock. 

Checking back in with her body, Beth found that she had enough feeling back in her hands that she could use them without flailing them around like the inflatable tube men Dean insisted on stationing outside the dealership no matter the weather. Her fingers reached for his chest before she had a chance to wonder whether Rio even enjoyed having his nipples played with. The logical PTA-mom-Stepford-Wife voice that had been guiding her life for over a decade piped up from the recesses of her mind that ‘If he had a problem with it, there was an excellent chance that he’d be more than happy to set her straight.’ Finding her own internal logic to be sound, she mentally shrugged just as she lightly ran her fingers over his nipple, watching in fascination as it puckered to a small, hard point. 

She toyed with the taut peak for over a minute as she ran the pad of her thumb over it again and again with various degrees of pressure, even going so far as to lightly scrape it with her nails, the entire time cataloguing the various responses she pulled from his body. The varying degrees of pressure brought about by her probing thumb barely earned her more than a half-smirk, while accidentally tweaking it elicited a deep guttural groan accompanied by an extended eyeroll. She positively beamed with excitement to see how easily his tawny skin broke out in goosebumps as she skimmed her nails over his collarbone and along the edges of all the tattoos that were newly uncovered for her perusal. Of all the ways Rio reacted to her though, the one that she appreciated the most was how readily he rolled over on to his back at the gentlest of presses against his hipbone. 

Beth pushed herself up with less grace and fluidity than she would’ve liked given the age gap between them: it was a sore spot for her after finding out _just_ how young some of Dean’s “child brides” had been. As much as she wished it was otherwise, she couldn’t help but feel self-conscious any time she did something that drew attention to how much older she was than the usual women she was confident Rio slept with. Nonetheless, when she happened to glance back up at his dark brown eyes, she felt disproportionately comforted by the amount of unashamed lust he was conveying through his hooded gaze. She scooched her way down to his knees, mainly by crawling backwards and praying that she didn’t inadvertently find an unexpected mattress edge in the process. For a brief second, she thought about rubbing her tender pussy against the wiry hairs on his thigh as she got herself into position, but ultimately decided against it, if for no other reason than she wasn’t completely sure her body could handle the stimulation so soon after experiencing two massive orgasms. 

When she finally made it down to his knees, she sat back up and simply drank him in for a minute. Her growing excitement over finally getting to see all of _him_ helped crush any self-consciousness she may have felt about displaying the softer, pillowier parts of her own body for his unavoidable inspection. She looked up at him in a token request for permission, her right hand already reaching for his waistband. When he didn’t do or say anything she felt could be construed as consent, her hand stopped in mid-air, her fingertips close enough to his skin that she could touch him if he twitched, and she arched one of her own eyebrows as if to say “ _Well?_ ” 

That infuriating smirk that both set her teeth on edge and caused her pussy to positively drip with arousal slowly spread across his mouth, catching the light just so on a couple parts of his chin that were still wet from eating her out. Her pussy clenched hard at the sight and she had to fight back a desperate urge to moan. She was still staring at him expectantly when suddenly Rio said in sort of perverse, yet oddly playful mockery of Dean, “Whatchu say, ma, you just window shopping or you gonna go for a test drive?” 

Beth softened her raised eyebrow as she “thoughtfully” bit her lower lip. In a breathy, helpless voice, she teased back, “I don’t know. I’m not sure I can handle that much engine. It’s _much_ bigger than I’m used to driving.” 

He gave her a blinding megawatt smile, and for a moment, Beth found herself temporarily wondering if he’d seen an orthodontist as a child or if he’d simply won the genetic dental lottery. The part of her that was still stinging over the $315 monthly installment payments Dean had functionally strong-armed her into paying toward Kenny’s braces saltily imagined it was the latter. She quashed the thought before it had a chance to take deeper root in her mind. Dean had ruined enough things in her life; she wasn’t going to add sex with the hottest man she’d ever seen to the list. 

For a brief second, she contemplated foregoing her plan to melt his brain with her mouth, but then she heard him whisper, “Then it sounds like you _deserve_ an upgrade. Something that can really put some _vroom vroom vroom_ back in _your_ engine, Elizabeth.” 

While it was true that Rio that successfully given her not one, but two soul-realigning orgasms in an hour, the smugness with which he let her know that _he_ knew he was responsible for the best sex she’d ever had triggered a “hold my beer” challenge in her as she bristled at the suggestion—whether real or imagined—that _she_ was incapable of similarly rocking his world. Fueled by the same competitive urge that once drove her to bake and individually decorate eight hundred cupcakes in six different flavors including gluten-free and nut-free because Jocelyn Penniman remarked at her first meeting as incoming PTA President that she “recognized none of the _older_ moms” had the “time or energy” to make more than one batch of cupcakes for the inaugural school fundraiser, Beth confidently slid her fingers under the soft waistband of his underwear and began to carefully tug it down, mindful of his very prominent erection eagerly waiting to bob free. The tips of her fingers skimmed over the taut muscles in his thighs and she once again found herself marveling over how deceptively strong his body was. Her attention, however, was soon irresistibly drawn to his engorged cock. Given the natural honeyed hue of Rio’s skin, she found herself a little shocked to see his penis appeared to be nearly the same shade of reddish-peach as she was accustomed to. In a strange way, recognizing the similarity bolstered her confidence in impressing the enigmatic man beneath her with her oral skills; other than the technical difficulties posed by his impressive length and girth, in the end, his cock functioned the same as any other. 

She shimmied his boxer-briefs the rest of the way down his legs, intentionally turning to give him an unobstructed view of her creamy, pale ass as she bent over his feet to dislodge the unnecessary garment. For a moment, she turned to look back at him. She could only wonder how difficult it was for him to remain laid out beneath her given the intense way his eyes were burning into her flesh. As she knelt across his legs, her ass popped up for his inspection, her full breasts swinging heavily underneath her, she could tell he was on the verge of saying something—‘likely a command to come fuck him,’ she thought with a little self-satisfaction. Beth didn’t want his words though—not yet anyway. No, she wanted him groaning, and begging, and struggling with incoherence. 

Beth gave her ass a playful wiggle before she stalked back up the length of his legs until her mouth could easily reach his bobbing cock when she leaned over him. Gripping his base firmly earned her an almost inaudible hiss, a reaction she felt was barely justified given her hand wasn’t even able to completely close around his girth. She tested her grip by experimentally running her hand up and down his length a few times. At first, she adjusted the pressure she was applying—first harder, then a little softer—before settling on an erratic pulsating combination of both when she noticed the white knuckles on his hands as he clutched at his comforter. Next, she decided on a speed. She wanted to draw his pleasure out the same way he’d done to her, so she needed to find the sweet spot between “impatient teenage boy” fast and “not actually trying to get off” slow. Paying careful attention to the way his chest would constrict with every suppressed groan, Beth eventually settled on a steady, hypnotic rhythm that wasn’t quite a 4/4 count. It was slow enough that she wasn’t worried about giving him a friction burn on his cock, yet _just_ fast enough that she’d risk locking up her elbow if she kept at it too long. 

Once she had her basics established, Beth started to get fancy. There was an artful wrist twist on every second or third upward stroke--just to keep him guessing--that put a little extra pressure on the sensitive ridge of his penis. Then, she’d randomly throw in an open-palm massage on a down stroke that would seamlessly segue into her lightly dragging her nails over his pleasantly manscaped balls as she fondled him for a minute or two. When he started rocking his hips into her hand, she stopped touching him, opting instead to lean over him, pressing feathery kisses against his lower abdomen as his increasingly redder cock periodically managed to thrust between her dangling breasts. 

As she worked her lips down his abs toward his hip bones, she heard his lust-filled voice say “ _Elizabeth…_ ” in a gruff moan that was part warning, part anguish. She smirked to herself as she popped her head up from his body and batted her most innocently-wide baby blues in his direction in a “butter-wouldn’t-melt-in-my-mouth” look. He scowled in response as she watched the realization dawn on his face that she was intentionally torturing him. It was only once she knew he figured out what she was doing that she returned her hand to his throbbing cock--eagerly assisted by her mouth. 

At first, she only took the tip of his penis into her mouth so that her jaw had a chance to adjust to the much more significant stretching than it was used to. Her hand continued its previously coordinated dance, only now some of the calculated squeezes and twists were replaced by Beth varying the pressure with which she sucked on him. As her mouth became more comfortable with his impressive girth, she started sliding him further and further toward the back of her throat, taking pains to breathe through her nose in order to keep her throat relaxed and her gag reflex in check. Keeping herself propped up with one arm, she used the leverage provided by her quasi-push-up stance to help piston her mouth up and down on his cock as her right hand continued to work his shaft. The longer she kept her mouth stretched around him, the more she could feel beads of drool beginning to pool at the side of her mouth as her salivary glands started going into overdrive. Despite that, she continued to maintain her unhurried pacing. 

Finally, he broke. Even though he was muttering in what she presumed was Spanish, she recognized the near-universal _tone_ of pleading in his voice as his unfamiliar words were interspersed with unmistakable moans of need. She felt pride explode within her chest like a firework display. Beth pulled back from his cock just enough for her to more easily run figure eights with her tongue over and around his head as she simultaneously increased the speed and force of her sucking. The hand working his shaft sped up, the excess saliva left behind by her mouth helping to reduce the additional friction. 

She felt his balls start to tighten on one of her down strokes, which was soon after confirmed by Rio’s voice saying in a dark warning, “ _Don’t._ ” Given what she knew of his age, Beth was quite confident that the man whose body was desperately close to orgasm would have no problems getting hard enough again to fuck her: so she ignored him. The hand working his length momentarily dropped to roll his balls with her fingers eliciting a small hiss as his hips jerked forcefully toward her mouth. Before she returned her hand, she decided to lightly graze her fingernails along his shaft as she artfully bobbed her head up and down. Her fingers were almost to the seal of her mouth when she heard Rio’s gutted voice cry, “ _Madre de Díos_ , Elizabeth!”

A second later, his hips jumped and a familiar hot tangy viscosity filled her mouth in intermittent spurts. She tried swiping at the head of his cock with a flat, sweeping movement of her tongue to capture as much of his cum as possible; however, even her most fastidious efforts couldn’t stop the slow dribbles of excess ejaculate from leaking through the porous seal of her lips. As she continued her vigorous sucking to ensure she drained every last drop from his balls, Beth felt the side of her right index finger get tackier as his escaping cum smeared on her skin every time her stroking hand met her leaking mouth. Before long, Rio’s deflating cock started to slip out of the warm inviting cavern of her mouth. Beth closed her eyes as she swallowed the last of the vaguely gelatinous liquid that was still held in her cheeks imagining for a moment that she was consuming an especially musky oyster. 

When she reopened her eyes, the first thing she noticed was the way his droopy cock dangled over his balls like a tanner version of the “forgotten” bananas she was forever discovering in Danny’s superhero lunchbox when she was prepping her kids’ lunches for the following day. Almost immediately _after_ that revelation though was the realization that Rio was doing his best to stare at her through slitted eyes that appeared to be losing a battle with exhaustion. Beth gaped at him. He barely managed to stifle a yawn as he said in response to her look, “Tried...tell ya...ma...jackin’ it...pu’s m’ t’ slee…” The truth of his statement was evident in the small snore that punctuated the end of his sentence in place of what she thought was supposed to be the word “sleep.” 

To say that his unexpected reaction to her blowjob had the odd distinction of both fueling her ego and deflating her at the same time was an understatement. On the one hand, she felt exceedingly pleased with herself that she managed to give him such an intense orgasm that she almost immediately knocked him unconscious. Unfortunately, that also meant she was a victim of her own success as his reaction put a decided crimp in her hopes that he would fuck her silly. She shifted on his bed a little sadly: she didn’t really want to leave yet, but she could hardly imagine he wanted a woman who was marginally a step above a Tinder date sleeping over at his house. Pushing herself up a little further, she rolled artlessly to the other side of his legs, quickly filling the empty space in his bed like she was meant to be there. Beth shook her head slightly, refusing to get drawn down an all-too-tempting fantasy path. Instead, after taking a second to savor the comforting warmth radiating off his naked torso the way she would a square from her secret stash of dark chocolate-covered marzipan, she went to roll further off his bed so she could start collecting her clothes. 

Once again, she made it as far as rolling on to her hip before Rio stopped her--this time rolling over as well, curling himself around her like the ideal big spoon to her little spoon. Her eyes shot wide in shock at his mostly unconscious gesture and she froze. Beth was in the midst of figuring out the most efficient way to get out from under his sinewy arm when Rio’s sleep-roughened voice murmured from just over her shoulder, “Y’ thin’ too much, Elizabeth. Jus’ go t’ sleep.” As if to emphasize the underlying current of his words--namely, that he wanted her to stay--he threw one of his well-defined legs over her lower body, essentially trapping her in a more cuddly leg lock. Before she knew it, the allure of sleep combined with the fleshy security blanket of his body pulled her into the most restful slumber she’d experienced in years. 

******************************************

Something was tickling his nose--something wispy...with the distinctive smell of grapefruit and lemongrass. He went to move his hand to brush off whatever it was that was on his face when his brain registered a small moan, and he simultaneously realized two things. First, he wasn’t alone in his apartment like he expected. Second, his hand was currently cupping a very soft, very generous breast. Without opening his eyes--he wasn’t quite prepared to deal with the fact that he must’ve gotten so hard up the night before that he took some random woman home--he flicked his thumb absently over the woman’s nipple, feeling himself begin to get hard as the nub pebbled eagerly under his finger. He was in the middle of toying with her nipple again, when Rio heard a _very_ familiar voice say after a satisfied moan, “ _Well, good morning_.” 

Rio didn’t think he’d ever completely woken up quite so quickly in his life. 

As his brain came back online, he remembered _everything_ that happened the night before: him bringing her to orgasm twice, and then her repaying him with the most intense blowjob he’d ever experienced. Then, he remembered they had some unfinished business to attend to. 

Curling tighter around her midsection, Rio made sure that Elizabeth could feel every demanding inch of his cock as he pressed his hips more firmly against the inviting pale swell of her ass. He smiled against her hair when her hips pressed back against him with an encouraging wriggle and a soft little whimper slipped out of her. The considerable weight of her breast rested naturally in the palm of his hand, almost as if she’d been made for him. He tamped the thought down before he got too carried away with his fantasy, but the feeling of greediness for her continued to haunt the recesses of his mind like a ghost. His fingers tugged intently in her increasingly hard nipples, periodically switching between each breast, as he consciously tried not to abuse the tender flesh of one breast more than the other. 

Blowing lightly against the shell of her ear, he was able to see each and every goosebump that dotted her skin, and he found himself growling, “I believe you and I have some unresolved business, Elizabeth.” He nuzzled his face against the side of her neck, using his nose to separate the strawberry-blonde curtain of her hair, until he could smell the clean, somewhat fruity, somewhat peppery musk that was uniquely _her_. As his cock began to throb mercilessly, Rio came up with a plan: a plan to take his time, to explore every inch of Elizabeth in the full light of day, to claim every square of her skin with his hands and his lips and his teeth, before only then bringing her to a gut-wrenching orgasm with his dick. His “plan” such as it was lasted a grand total of about seven heartbeats. That was roughly as long as it took for his brain to appreciate that she was squirming against him, her legs rubbing against each other as she periodically squeezed her thighs. Automatically, his brain kicked into “dad” mode as he instinctively recognized the signs of Marcus’ “I-waited-too-long-now-I-have-to-go-the-bathroom” dance, and the words “Do you need to pee?” were out of his mouth before he had a chance to swallow them. 

Of all the possible reactions he could’ve imagined Elizabeth having to that question, a clear, tinkling laugh was not one of them. Before he had a chance to probe her about it though, she said in an aroused voice, “No, but I can’t believe how horny I feel right now. I’m pretty sure I’m already wet, but you’ve hardly touched me.”

The hand fondling her breast slowly dropped from her chest. Even though he wanted to dive into her pussy with his hand and verify her statement for himself, he forced himself to hold back. Unless she had somewhere to be at what he believed was some time around 5 a.m. on a Sunday, he could take all the time he needed. As his fingers ghosted over her torso, she jerked in on herself as she tried to cover up a small shriek. ‘Ticklish,’ he thought a little devilishly, filing the information away for later. He carefully moved his hand to the broad plane of her upper thigh, rubbing his palm in soothing circles over her skin until her body untensed. She uncurled slowly like the flowers in the nature videos at the zoo that his son was obsessed with. Her chest was halfway back to its original position when he subtly slid his hand across the front of her thigh until his fingers were able to graze the smooth entrance of her pussy. Elizabeth only shifted a millimeter or so, but in doing so, she opened up the cant of her hips so that her legs fell open enough for him to work his fingers inside her without the added resistance of her clenched thighs in the way.

He groaned in unison with her as his slightly calloused fingertips slipped easily into the warm, inviting moisture of her pussy. For a minute, he let his fingers simply rest inside her while he shared Elizabeth’s amazement that she was so turned on when all he’d done was cop a bit of a feel and dry hump her a little. Her velvety walls suddenly squeezed against his index and middle fingers, helping him realize he’d unconsciously slid his digits deeper inside her. Almost as soon as he realized what he’d done with his hand, his brain provided him enticing thoughts of how good it would feel to slide something _else_ inside her—something very much thicker than his fingers. Rio leaned his chest heavily against her back, trying to moderate his breathing, as his cock painfully throbbed from its need to find its way back into her snug pussy. His heart rate had almost returned to normal when Elizabeth clenched her core around his fingers again--only twice as hard as before--causing him to let out a feral growl of warning. 

“Rio,” she keened in a breathy voice that tightened his balls, “ _please_ . I _need_ you…” Her voice drifted off as she rolled her hips back against his pelvis in invitation. The wispy plea in her voice shattered whatever resolve he’d been trying to hold on to in an attempt to prove to himself that he _wasn’t_ that man who immediately jumped a woman merely because she offered. ‘Stop tryin’ to be all noble an’ shit,’ he mentally scolded himself. ‘You met car man. You jus’ gonna giv’ her a complex, you keep holdin’ out on her.’ 

Rio pumped his fingers in and out of her a few more times before he removed them from her pussy so that he could lean over to his perfectly matched cypress wood bedside table and grab a condom from the box he kept stashed there “just to be safe.” Even as he was unwrapping the latex, a tiny part of him pouted. He was normally fanatical about safe sex, especially after Alicia had “forgotten” her contraception so many times that they wound up with Marcus, and actually _felt better_ about having sex with a woman who expected him to use protection because it meant she took her own health seriously. That being said though, he couldn’t deny that all of the sensations from sex were just.... _heightened_ ...when barebacking simply by virtue of the direct skin-to-skin contact. Knowing that from a strictly empirical sense normally didn’t bother him, but he and Elizabeth _had_ had unprotected sex before: he knew precisely how amazing her tight, wet pussy felt sliding over his aching cock. Even though he was curled up behind her, he still didn’t want to risk dislodging the dangerous thought trying to take root in his mind by doing anything other than imperceptibly shaking his head. It was like he was always telling Marcus, he thought, ‘If you don’t correct something the first time you mess up, the only lesson you’re teaching is that being sloppy will be tolerated, and that’s unacceptable.’ 

Just as he was getting ready to roll the condom over his shaft, Elizabeth made as if she was going to roll over to face him, and he quickly stopped her. “Don’t worry, ma. I got this,” he purred next to her ear as he proceeded to finish covering his cock with the latex. Once he was satisfied that the condom was properly secured, he gripped her knee and hooked her leg back over his thigh as he slid his cock inside her. He let out a deep groan as he worked himself deeper into her welcoming wet warmth, her walls gripping at him with each inch deeper he got. Kissing the side of her neck, he rocked his hips in a slow building rhythm against her, drinking in every sigh and muted whimper Elizabeth made. 

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

Beth had never spooned and fucked at the same time: it was a strange sort of intimacy. Rio felt impossibly deep inside her, but there was a softness from the way he was curled around her, gently palming her breasts that made the position feel more intimate than doing it doggie style the way Dean favored. 

The steady rhythm of his hips was torturous. Every few strokes he’d thrust forward just a little deeper, hitting a spot inside her that made her see stars, but she wanted more--more speed, more frequency...just more _something_ . “ _Rio_ ,” she whinged pleadingly, punctuating her uncertain request with a high pitched whine. 

With little more of a prompt than the sound of his name on her lips, Beth found herself flipped on to her back staring into the magnetic brown pools of his eyes as his hips slapped faster against hers. She drew her legs up around his hips, and ran her hands over the smooth tense planes of his chest. He groaned when her nails accidentally scratched across his nipples causing them to stiffen into tight pebbles begging for her to suck on them. The urge to taste him was so strong, she craned her neck until the delicate pink tip of her tongue flicked against his sensitive skin. Beth grinned against his chest when his hips stuttered for a moment, a thrill of power running through her at the idea that she could affect him as easily as he affected her. She hummed against his nipple, curious to see what other reactions she could elicit from him. 

Whatever she was expecting, Beth felt pretty confident that hearing him say in a guttural voice, “Use your teeth,” wasn’t it. A part of her was scared of hurting him, afraid of being too exuberant, but a larger part of her _wanted_ to sink her teeth into his flesh, wanted to mark his body as her own. She gave in to her darker urge and bit down. 

Rio hissed, and Beth had a fleeting moment of panic that she’d actually hurt him until she felt his cock practically vibrate within the confines of her pussy. Feeling how visceral his response was turned her on even more than she thought possible, and she needed to feel more of it. With his hips still pistoning against her, she raked her nails down his back, letting a tinkling laugh escape as he let out a moan right before he bit down on her shoulder. A surprisingly squeaky “ _Ahh!_ ” slipped out of her as she felt the unexpectedly sharp sting of his teeth against her skin along with his smug grin at her reaction. 

“ _Please_ ,” she begged, not entirely sure what she was asking for. 

The start of his five o’clock shadow scraped teasingly against her cheek as he moved infinitesimally closer to her ear until she heard him whisper, “I got you, Elizabeth.”

Without breaking his relentless pacing, he managed to push himself further away from her chest until there was enough distance between their torsos for him to easily snake his fingers between them to rub at her clit. Her eyes snapped shut at the same moment that her hips jerked sharply toward him, and she keened, “Oh God, Rio!”

Given the necessary distance he’d put between their bodies, Beth found herself at a loss for what to do with her hands as the inhumanely talented man inside her overwhelmed all of her senses--leaving one hand flailing uselessly beside them, while the other was on the verge of rending his expensive comforter with her white-knuckle grip. She heard him chuckle above her after a little while, and she was glad her eyes were closed, afraid of whatever mocking look he might have in response to the idiot she was probably making of herself as she completely gave her body over to him. Despite her utter conviction that she was making a fool of herself, she still couldn’t keep from complying when his voice drifted softly down to her as he said, “Look at me, Elizabeth. I wanna see your eyes when you touch yourself for me.” 

It took her a minute to understand precisely what he meant, but her comprehension was assisted by Rio deftly grabbing her flailing hand and moving it so that her fingers were circling her clit in time with his thrusts. Her eyes rolled back in her head at the dirtiness of it, loving every second of playing with herself while he fucked her good and hard. As if on cue, her fingers began rubbing harder and faster as she held his ceaseless eye contact while he coached her, “That’s right, Elizabeth. Just like that. Be my good girl. I wanna feel you cum good and hard with my cock buried deep inside you.” 

There was a suspended moment of time as Rio’s hips slammed into her pussy with slightly more oomph and her index and middle fingers were on the downward arc of rubbing her clit when Rio’s body managed to trap her hand between their bodies. She let out a shocked squeak as the extra pressure on her clit abruptly punted her over the edge into a full-body convulsing orgasm. The legs that had been clenched around his hips like a vise slowly slid down the outside of his legs until she felt her big toes tracing lazy circles around his ankles. Beth was so blissed out from the oxytocin coursing through her body from her orgasm that she barely even registered the stuttering of Rio’s hips when he came moments after her. If not for the almost slo-motion way he collapsed just to the side of her chest and began murmuring softly next to her ear, she was pretty sure she might not even have realized Rio came too given how oblivious she felt. 

The dead weight of his arm across her chest combined with the soothing heat he seemed to naturally produce like a living hot-water bottle insidiously worked to lull Beth back into a peaceful, dreamless sleep. 

*********************************************

When Rio woke up from his second sex-induced catnap several hours later, two things were immediately apparent. First, his apartment smelled suspiciously like blueberry pancakes. Second, Elizabeth was nowhere to be found. 

Rolling out of his rumpled bed with cat-like grace, he padded over to his bureau to grab a fresh pair of boxer-briefs before stepping quickly into his bathroom. After he finished his usual waking-up routine, he ambled over to the island in his open plan kitchen where a foil-covered plate was sitting next to a meticulously folded piece of to-do paper from the pad stuck to his fridge. Carefully removing the foil on the plate, he was unsurprised to find a neat stack of eight, perfectly executed “Mickey Mouse”-style blueberry pancakes that were still warm. Somehow, he just knew that her choice of pancake design was an unconscious one fueled by _years_ of making pancakes for her four kids. He, on the other hand, _consciously_ chose to ignore the fact that he’d automatically set two of the pancakes aside for Marcus to have later after he picked his son up from his mom’s house. 

As Rio worked his way through his fourth pancake, he let a little huff of air out through his nose. He’d been side-eyeing Elizabeth’s note the entire time he’d been eating debating whether he should even read it. The longer he stared at it, the more convinced he became that he already knew what it said: it was fun, she made a mistake, better if they both just pretended they hadn’t slept together (twice), and he honestly didn’t want to hear it. He knew she’d had fun; he’d been there, actively participating in the fun: telling him she had fun seemed redundant to him. Likewise, the idea that she probably wanted him to believe that despite the undeniable chemistry between them, having sex together again was a mistake made his blood boil in a way he didn’t want to examine too closely at 10 a.m. 

The note paper was already starting to crumple in his fist when the overly scrupulous businessman in him reminded Rio just why he’d succeeded so well where so many others around him failed--he ALWAYS remembered to read the fine print. Not taking the time to dot every i, cross every t and cross-reference every footnote was how he’d seen far too many businessmen in both his legitimate and his illegal ventures get the short end of the stick. He stopped wadding the paper up into a ball. 

Her delicate handwriting was mesmerizing, but what really had him captivated was the actual substance of her note. ‘ _Rio--you looked too serene for me to wake you up before I left. Dean’s mother is supposed to be dropping the kids off at my house some time between 9:30 and 1 though, so I had to make sure I got home in time. I hope the pancakes make up for me leaving without a good-bye at least a little bit--blueberry just so happens to be my specialty! Maybe next time I can actually cook you something we could eat together….Who knows? I bet just calling me though is going to be much cheaper for you than having to go through Dean._ ’ 

He reread the note twice, turning the paper over and over each time. His eyes hadn’t deceived him--she’d told him to call her, but deliberately didn’t give him her phone number. It was a total boss move--making him do the legwork of proving how badly he wanted to see her again--and he had to admit, he was living for it. Rio polished off the last of his designated pancakes, and returned to his closet to finish getting dressed: Elizabeth had just thrown down a gauntlet, and far be it for him not to accept her challenge.

  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  


**Author's Note:**

> Whew! You made it all the way through the slow burn to Beth and Rio's gooey centers!! WOOHOO!!!!
> 
> Comments/kudos/bookmarking/reblogging all help feed the soul, in case you feel like taking an extra minute or two to let me know your thoughts. 🤗🤗🤗😁😁😁
> 
> **English/Spanish translations**  
> ¡Tio! ¡Tio! ¡Ayudame!--Uncle! Uncle! Help me!  
> Lo siento.--I'm sorry.  
> princesas--princesses  
> Pendejo--motherfucker  
> ¿Hermano, no puedes darle un trabajo? --Brother, can't you give him a job?  
> ¿Pués?--Well?  
> Entonces, ¿cuál es el problema? Tu hermana está encantada con su esposo--Then, what is the problem? Your sister is in love with her husband.  
> Tienes cuatro sobrinas--You have four nieces.  
> tu hermana--your sister  
> Dios mio!--My God!  
> Quiero una Carla--I want a Carla.  
> Mi querido, ella está una idiota. No sabe lo que necesita--My dear, she is an idiot. She doesn't know what she needs.  
> Necesitas una buena mujer--You need a good woman.  
> Compra tu hermana un nuevo coche.--Buy your sister a new car.  
> bruja--witch  
> Cabrón--asshole  
> Es verdad.--It's true.  
> No se, hermano.--I don't know, brother.  
> No puedo explicarlo.--I can't explain it.  
> no lo hagas.--Don't do it.  
> Eres hermosa--You're beautiful.  
> Díos te salve, María. Llena eres de gracía--Hail Mary, full of grace.  
> Madre de Díos--Mother of God.


End file.
